Mass Effect - The Internal Machinations of Shooting Stars
by MizDirected
Summary: BOOK TWO of The Machinations Cycle. If you haven't read Internal Machinations of Exploding Stars, it's best to start there. Shepard and Garrus have arrived on Palaven to build their new life, but old enemies have long memories and are never far behind. Warning: Sexah times.
1. Chapter 1

**June 30, 2188**

He wrapped his arm around her, pulling her softness in tight against him. Nuzzling her brow, his eyes slipped closed, and he used his mouth to see her. He caressed her skin, smiling at every subtle flaw, every scar. Her scent filled him as if, for those precious few moments, they became one person, the sweet spicy floral magic of her filling him. Now, after making love, the intoxicating animal scents of sweat and desire crawled through him, teasing every nerve ending with the memory of her touch.

She moved against him, stirring sleepily. He nipped her earlobe. "You can't sleep yet." If she fell asleep, it would break apart.

She smiled and reached up to caress his face, her fingertips trickling over him like warm, late summer rain. "Garrus?"

"Mmmm?" He slid his mouth across her shoulder, his tongue savouring the brine of her exertion even as her body still rippled like waves under his hand. His thumb drew slow arcs under her navel, making her skin lift into gooseflesh. Spirits, he loved when it did that.

"My people have a saying that when we die, our life flashes before our eyes." She leaned up on her elbow, looking into his eyes, the emerald depths flashing with hope. She was always most like a girl just after making love - most alive. "Do you think, maybe, in that moment, we have a chance to see ahead as well as behind? Do you think it lets us see what might have been?"

He shook his head, sighing. His long talons brushed through her hair, playing with the short, silken curls. "I don't know. Maybe." He gave her a turian frown. "Might be sad ... to see all the 'what could have beens'. Let's just forget dying, Shepard, and stay in this moment as long as we can." He closed his eyes again and brushed his lips along her cheekbone to the cool, soft tip of her nose.

"Mmm, I love it when you touch me like that," she sighed.

"Like what?" Subtle, Vakarian, but he needed Earth and all its terrible consequences to stay outside the door, far away from the warmth and comfort of the woman wrapped around him, legs and arms entwined with his.

She smiled and kissed him, dragging her bottom lip from his mouth to his nose and then his brow. "Like someone putting a piece of chocolate in their mouth and just letting it melt." She laced her fingers with his and pulled his arm around her.

His mandibles spread and fluttered hard at that. "I like that," he whispered. "An apt analogy."

"Mmmm..." She stretched long and slow, running the pad of her foot up his leg to his spur, teasing the nerve endings there. "I think it would be nice." She whispered, kissing his neck, starting near his cowl, following the hollow of his throat. She nipped him, grinning when he rumbled deep in his throat. Her tongue flicked out under his jaw, kissing and teasing.

"What would be nice, my love?" He froze, the words slipping out through the wall so carefully constructed. Damn, he always made sure not to say those things first.

Instead of pulling away, instead of giving him that look, she smiled and curled in tight against him. "A chance to see that life, even if just for a second in that moment where everything is poised to be lost …." She paused, and he could feel her breath on his mandible as she caressed it with her lips, making her way to his mouth. She kissed him, her mouth soft, moist and warm as she whispered. "... my love."

He growled low in his throat as her tongue teased his. He pulled back a little. "Let's just forget about that for a while. Deal?"

She leaned up, crawling up his body, low enough that her breasts pressed against him. He slid his hands up her sides, following the map of scars and freckles by memory to all the places that made her sigh and smile, that slightly wanton, hungry smile reserved only for him. Talon tips snagged on new, catastrophic scars, his eyes pressing closed tighter as he turned his head away.

She dragged her leg over him, slow and lazy, straddling his thighs. Leaning down to kiss his chin. "What's wrong? Why won't you look at me, Garrus?" She moved over him, teasing, then laughing bright and loud when he couldn't stand it any longer and grabbed her in his arms.

Her fingers spread then clutched his in rhythm with his hips, her head thrown back, mouth open, back arched.

He saw her so clearly projected against his closed eyelids, struck anew, in awe of her beauty, of the passion that radiated from every cell when she finally dropped her shields, letting him in. She was a goddess, and he couldn't let her go.

She leaned down, pressing her mouth to his cheek, panting hard and lusty. She tilted her head, opening her neck to him. "Garrus? Aren't you here with me?"

He chuckled and ran his teeth over the skin, nipping lightly, then harder as she pressed into him, moaning low and heavy, deep in her throat. Each panting breath came faster, more shallow, then she arched hard into him, turning to kiss his face. Lips like dew covered leaves teased and sucked, tongue dancing across his skin.

A jolt of electricity ripped through him, the sweet, tangy scent of Shepard's soap, the intoxicating animal scent of her lust turning to ash.

He forced himself to focus on the sensation of her sweat dripping onto his skin, the pulse of her muscles. If he let her, she could wrap him in a cocoon where nothing existed outside of her. The scent of blood, heavy with copper and decay, wove its way through the rest.

_No. No._

He placed her hands against his chest, trying to pretend the hard ridges of knuckle and small bone remained covered with flesh. "Shepard, no, not yet. Please, not yet." He slid his talons up her arms and across her shoulder blades, flesh and bone sharp, torn and broken under his palms. Eyes squeezed shut so hard his head began to ache, he managed to conjure the magic for another, precious moment.

For that one moment, they poured into one another. One perfect second like light glistening through a raindrop before it falls from the leaf, immortal as it spins, making love to the air before embracing the earth.

"Mmmm." Shepard sighed, wrapping herself around him, as he turned onto his side. "God, that was... " She chuckled. "Mmmmm. It was as perfect as I could have wished for, but I'm dead, Garrus. You know this. It's time to let me go."

He shook his head, keeping his eyes closed tight as he nuzzled her ear. Rumbles rolled up through his second larynx as her fingertips stroked the hollow of his pelvis and the inside of his thigh. "If we're going to get any sleep, you need to stop doing that."

She grinned. "Mmm, no, I'm afraid I can't do that. This is all just a dream, Garrus. Twenty four hours after this moment, I died. You can't deny it forever, my love."

No. No, he could deny it forever, if she'd just let him. He shook his head, the rhythm of her hand easing him toward sleep. Just as he began to doze, he heard her question play through his mind. "Why did you ask about seeing your life flash in front of your eyes, Shepard?"

She curled into him, and kissed his chin. "Because it's been beautiful."

The perfect moment shattered, tearing him from her arms and flinging him onto the filth of that London street. Shepard threw herself to the ground, the tank flipping over her head. All Garrus could do was watch death come for him. Fire burst through the air all around him as time slowed to a perfect, horrific crawl.

Shepard grabbed him, breaking the spell as she dragged him into the shelter of the upended tank. He stared at her, stunned, blinded and deafened by the chaos. Darkness pressed in at the edges of his vision. He felt all the broken pieces, the cooling of his blood, the slowing of his heart.

"Oh god! Garrus!" Shepard reached up to her radio, screaming over the roar of Reapers and thunder of explosions. "_Normandy_, I need a pick up!" She glanced up at James. "You okay?"

The Marine nodded, crouched by her side, gasping.

Sound, so much noise, pounded at Garrus's brain, making him want to scream for them all to stop - to stand still for one moment so he could say goodbye properly.

_Peace, please just a little peace. Let me have this one last moment. _

Garrus reached up and touched her face. "It's okay Shepard. You've got to keep going. My road has come to its end."

"Not until I get you to safety." She held him close, staring into his eyes, where he knew she saw the truth, but remained unwilling to acknowledge it. "We'll get you out of here. Dr. Chakwas will set you straight."

"No." He gave her his best smile. "No. But don't worry, it's you and me right to the end. We finish this together."

She hugged him and bent to kiss him, then pressed her brow to his, her voice thick and harsh with tears. "You're supposed to lay me down in the grass in that spot on Palaven and make love to me."

He smiled, the war fading into a fog in the background, nothing mattered, nothing in existence more important that her. He touched her cheek again, his fingers leaving a blue smear through the soot and dirt. "I will. Don't worry, I will."

"Shepard!" The world exploded in red light.

"Garrus. Easy now, love."

Hands touched him, but he fought them off. Then he heard a sound, a piercing cry tore at his ears and his heart. He knew that sound. It pushed back the curtain of war, darkness, and death, dragging him back from the terror.

"Garrus? Look at me." A warm hand pressed to his cheek, cutting through the madness and fear. "Garrus. Come on, big guy. It was a dream. It was just a dream."

Shepard's face came into focus in front of his eyes.

"Shepard?" He latched onto her face, holding it between his hands, caressing it, stroking his talons through her hair, running gentle talon tips along the blue markings painted onto her pale skin. "Shepard? Dear spirits." He pulled her into his arms, clutching her tight against his chest. "You're okay." He nuzzled under her ear, breathing her in. No trace of death lingered. "Thank the spirits, you're okay."

She wrapped her arms around him, one hand stroking his neck. "Yes, I'm fine, my love. We're both fine. It was just a dream." She kissed his mandible, her lips soft, moist and so warm. "Shhhh now, it was a dream."

The crying became a shriek, harsh with shrill peaks that stabbed into his aural canals. "Shepard . . . Mercy. What's wrong with Mercy?"

"Nothing, she's just worried about her _pari_, and ticked off that her mari hasn't come to pick her up yet." Shepard eased back and kissed him. She brushed his cheekbones with her thumbs. "Are you back with me, love?"

"Yeah. Yeah. I'm here." Too fast and too jerky, he nodded and stood, fleeing. "I'll get Mercy." He needed space, just a little space to breathe and shake it off.

"Okay."

Even as he circled the bed to pick up his daughter, he watched Shepard hungrily out the corner of his vision. She pulled her t-shirt over her head and cast it aside, then piled her pillows behind her with a careless ease that made his entire body hum.

The moment he leaned over her crib, Mercy stopped crying, hiccoughing a little as she recovered from her upset. Garrus smiled down at her, her sweet little stub nose and round cheeks pulling him the rest of the way out of his nightmare. He folded back her blanket then lifted her up, his hands still able to hold all of her.

From the moment he saw her first scan, he'd felt an unbreakable conduit tie his soul to that tiny life. As she grew and then appeared in the world - so hurt, but so strong and brave - that bond had grown. Each time it got stronger, he thought it couldn't possibly, until the moment Karin placed her tiny, three-week-old body in his hands, and Mercy inhabited him completely.

"Hey there, beautiful little _Praela_. Did _Pari_ wake you up? Aww, I'm sorry, baby. _Pari_ doesn't mean to ruin your beauty sleep." He nuzzled her cheek. She giggled so he nuzzled her again. "You're so cute, I could eat you up." He made tasty child noises, then settled her in his arms. Beautiful, large blue eyes stared up into his. Like turian irises, Mercy's filled her whole eye, leaving just specks of white at the corners.

He cuddled her in against his chest.

"Dear spirits, you stink, little girl. I can't give you to your _mari_ smelling like this." He sighed deeply and shook his head with affected disgust. "What kind of an impression would a lady make with such a smelly butt?" He carried her around the bed to the desk, their makeshift changing table.

"That's hostile. We need to talk about _praela_s, sweet baby girl. They're warrior spirits, not toxic stench spirits." He laid her down and unfastened her little jumper to get to her diaper. She just smiled up at him, giggling as his voice oscillated up and down.

"Oh this is gross, baby. If _Pari_ passes out, don't follow him to the floor." He glanced behind him as the musical slide of Shepard's chuckle sent warm shivers down his spine. "Are we entertaining you?" he asked.

"Very much." Her smiled thawed any ice that remained hidden in his dark corners. "She loves when you talk to her."

He turned back to clean his daughter up. "Well, that's good, because I love talking to her." A couple of moments later, he settled Mercy into Shepard's arms, then climbed into bed next to them. Nothing gave him more peace than to lie curled in against Shepard's side, his head resting in the curve of her neck while his daughter nursed.

The first time he'd walked into med bay and saw Shepard feeding their baby, he'd stopped dead and just stared. Shepard flushed a deep red across her chest and up her neck, and asked him what he was looking at.

"The most beautiful thing I've ever seen," had been the only thought that entered his mind.

When the three of them curled up together, he felt as though the disparate and sharp-edged pieces of his life slid together, fitting into a comforting, easy whole. Well, almost everything. He glanced over at the single piece of art left on the wall above the couch.

They'd boxed up everything that belonged to Lenka except for Jane and the portrait he'd drawn of her and Shepard. Neither one of them could bear to have reminders of the empty space stabbed into them every moment. However, neither one of them had been able to bear packing everything away either. All the asses who'd told them that Mercy would replace the loss of Lenka had no idea. As much as he adored his little _praela_, he loved and missed Lenka just as much.

He tucked his face in tighter against Shepard's neck and closed his eyes.

"Tonight's was a real whopper, wasn't it?" she asked, her voice low and comforting. She reached up and pressed her hand against his cheek. Without waiting for an answer, Shepard turned to kiss his mandible. "Do you think getting off the _Normandy_ will help or hurt?"

He shook his head a little. "I don't think it's going to matter all that much, Shepard, but I hope it gets better once we're settled in our home, our dream real around us." Biting hard at the heels of his hope, dread hung thick and cloying, dripping between them.

"But that's also what has you worried, huh?" She sighed and pressed tighter, sliding a wall, warm and soft and alive, between him and his fears. "You're afraid that with the dream real around us, you'll be more convinced that's just what it is."

Grunting a reply, he just let out a long breath, his arm slipping around her as he listened to the soft sounds of his daughter. A whisper-soft talon traced the deep scar that bisected his baby's head. After all the surgeries, she still couldn't move her left side very well, that side of her face slower to react than the other. He smiled as her eyes left Shepard's face to latch onto his. As insane as it might make him, he truly believed one of the ancient _praela_ lived inside his child. Sometimes, when she looked into his eyes, he knew that she was telling him everything would be all right.

Mercy finished and Shepard bent down to kiss her forehead. "You go on over there and give your _pari_ a hug." She passed their child into his arms, then climbed out of bed and headed into the washroom.

Garrus's gaze flicked from loved feature to loved feature as he watched his wife cross the room, running what he hatefully called his terror inventory - comparing the real woman to the one who died over and over in his dreams. Some nights, the ones she didn't wake, he'd lean over her, just watching her breathe, running his upper mouth plate over the too sharp angle of her shoulder, the beautiful curving lines of the muscles in her arms, the soft belly that refused to go away completely after Mercy.

Like damp soil off a preteril's spines, Garrus tried to shake off the dream. Cradling Mercy between his cowl and shoulder, he rubbed her back with his talons, chuckling as she rewarded his effort with a delicate burp, a milk bubble forming between her sharply carved lips. He smiled, mandibles flicking as, that business complete, Mercy turned to regard him with those ancient, wise eyes, then reached over with her right hand to grasp his mandible.

"_Te amaten_," he whispered. He shifted her position so that he could nuzzle the dark red silk that covered most of her head. "You are your mother, precious girl."

"And she's you." Shepard sat next to him, her knee drawn up, her foot tucked under her. "That stubborn streak has to come from somewhere." Her smile said a great deal as she reached out to caress her daughter's hair and then his cheek. He'd learned from her that humans spoke with their faces in the same way turians used their second larynx. The slightest muscle movement under Shepard's creamy skin and smattered freckles could be the difference between, 'You are such an idiot' and "I love you, you idiot'.

Soft fingertips kissed his mandible. "Let's put her back to bed. She's got a big day tomorrow."

"Palaven. A new home." Garrus nodded and nuzzled Mercy's cheek. "Sleep sweet, _Praela_." He passed her into Shepard's arms, chuckling as his mate held Mercy up, dancing her around a tiny bit as she chattered away about nonsense, mostly encouraging the baby not to spit up on her.

"Your _pari_'s silly, isn't he?" Shepard asked, standing. "Laughing to himself over nothing. Yes he is, but we love him anyway, don't we? Yes, we do." She smiled down into the crib as she pulled up the blanket. "You're going to be impossible to get to sleep tomorrow night without the _Normandy_ singing you its lullaby, aren't you? Oh well, we'll just have to get your _pari_ to sing to you instead. Good night, precious." Shepard bent to press her lips to Mercy's forehead, lingering over the kiss for a long moment before straightening.

Garrus frowned, his brow plates lowering toward one another as Shepard spun to face him, her stare moving over him with a heat that made his mouth dry and his plates loose. "Shepard?"

Moving with coiled tension, Shepard crossed the metre to the bedside. Pointed toes called his attention to the long, lean lines and tight muscles of his mate's legs. Slowly swaying hips hypnotized with provocative command. Elegant, beckoning arms called him, breathless and yearning, into their embrace.

"Sweet spirits, woman, you're trying to kill me, aren't you?" he whispered, his heart pounding against his ribs.

She crawled to his side and knelt, loving fingertips teasing the hollow of his throat as she leaned into him, her cheek pressing against his scars. "I have a need," she whispered, low and sultry, the siren call of a savannah wind.

He buried his face in her neck, his mandibles fluttering just a touch, his heartbeat slowing but pounding strong and sure . . . painfully, gloriously alive. "Anything I can help you with?"

Lowering herself onto the mattress, she traced the contours of his face, her fingers leaving trails of warmth on his hide. "I sure hope so, because I need to feel my husband on top of me, and inside me." She grinned, her eyes dropping from staring into his to focusing on his mouth, as shy as she'd been wanton the moment before. Running her lower lip between her teeth, she tilted her head a little. "And you're the only husband I've got."

He rumbled as he leaned over her, sliding his mouth along the smooth sweep of her collarbone. "I think I can accommodate you. Let me get my calendar."

Shepard laughed, bright and sharp, her arms circling his neck to pull him into a long, deep kiss.


	2. Chapter 2

**July 1, 2188**

Arriving on the engineering deck, Garrus strode from the elevator and made a brisk turn for waste recycling, unsurprised to meet with an empty corridor. Two hours from landfall, off-duty held no meaning. Understaffed for a frigate her size, the _Normandy_ didn't lack for duties to keep all hands busy. He stepped through the door of waste recycling, the wall outside still labeled starboard cargo, and glanced down the narrow access between machinery. With an ironic flick of his mandibles, he grinned, imagining Diana Allers trapped, her perfectly made up face mashed against the starboard bulkhead.

_"Tonight on the Battlespace: This just in, I've been built into the Normandy's trash compactor. Tonight we'll talk with Admiral Jane Shepard to discover how she feels about this latest development. Good night and stay strong. Oh and send help . . . unless you're a creepy, turian fan."_

Five or six times she'd called him down to discuss the war. After his first appearance, and his suggestion that if she were appearing on vid she may want to change our of her nightclothes, each invitation surprised him a little more. Shepard's phrase 'beggar for punishment' fit well.

He stepped backwards out the door, a short huff of air defying his continued defeat as his thoughts returned to his purpose. Four decks swept. Targets not acquired. Spinning on his talons, he stalked toward the port cargo bay, now water storage and reclamation.

As he walked past the viewing area, a flash of movement in the shuttle bay below drew his attention. Stepping up to the portal, he leaned on the terminal, a sigh of both resignation and understanding blowing fog across the glass. Shepard pelted around the space between the cargo racks, sprinting between climbing a stack of crates on one side and vaulting over a series of them on the other. Judging by the sweat soaking her tank top, she'd been at it a while. The fat, rubber smacking of her trainer soles against the deck reached him even through the bulkhead.

With a compulsive urgency, Shepard spent the six months in transit grinding herself down, honing the blade so fine that he worried it might snap. Of course, Shepard didn't snap. No one had ever looked at Shepard and thought her weak, but her newly focused body of corded, fluid steel and eyes lit by bright, keen sparks of intelligence brought to mind one word: weaponized. A missile locked on target, she allowed herself no weakness, broached no excuses, set her sights on one acceptable outcome:

Lenka's return.

When not working her body, Shepard worked the system - planning, organizing, and sending out feelers. Endless hours passed as she paced back and forth in front of the QEC, tireless in her talks with Hackett, Victus, and a handful of the most powerful matriarchs on Thessia. Promises, bargains, favours, cajoling, and threats . . . the Shepard who'd chased Saren across the traverse returned. Sometimes Shepard turned to look at him, and a shudder crawled up his spine at the predatory fervour in her gaze. All the blood and heartache that tempered her through the cycles slipped away, turning her into a hunter once more. She'd made Garrus a promise, one he feared that she intended to keep by whatever means necessary.

Halfway through the journey to Palaven, working, solid lines of communication returned between the homeworlds, and Shepard set Liara to work planting agents on every world they could contact. Between them, they built a massive web of spiders feeling out Balak's bases, cutting off his supplies, and shutting down his funding.

The operation wouldn't swing into full gear until they landed on Palaven, but she'd already stung the batarian bastard hard enough for him to swat back. The night of the failed raid on Apostle bases throughout London, Bailey and his people found Leviathan artifacts in every compound. Destroying them yielded instant results as a great many Apostles awoke to discover a year or more of their life had vanished. A week later, the Alliance headquarters in London, Geneva, Sydney and Vancouver rocked with a series of bombings.

The casualties from those attacks just made Shepard more dogged. "I'll take a pound of flesh for every death traced back to Balak, even if I have to resurrect him and kill him again a thousand times."

Garrus shook off the melancholy that rode hard on the tail of Shepard's obsession and stared down through the window, his breath pluming another burst of fog on the thick glass. In a little over two hours, he'd lose her to her cause. Not that he wouldn't be right there with her, but . . .. Well, he'd never been very good with change.

He reached up and opened a channel to her radio. "Hey, Mrs. Vakarian, you're sweating on the deck plating. That constitutes a safety infraction. Steve could slip and fall. We can't afford the lawsuit."

Shepard completed her sprint to the ramp, then turned back, jogging on the spot and looked up to grin at him. "You spying on me, Mr. Vakarian?"

"Yes, because, spirits, you're sexy when you're sweaty." He chuckled, letting a heavy layer of lusty rumble bleed through. His talons ached to skate over her slick skin, obsessing over all the places her bones erupted through the softness. He cleared his throat and shook that thought off. "Even though I prefer it when I've made you all sweaty and wet." He grinned and preened, pleased with himself at the grumbling moan that answered him. Standing on his toes, he craned his head to see as much of the shuttle bay as he could. "Where's our daughter?"

"Learning how to procure supplies and repair Kodiaks." Shepard shrugged. "Never too early, I suppose." She waved. "Come down. We've got a couple of hours before we land, and we haven't tested your reach and my flexibility in a while."

Garrus felt his neck flush and shook his head at her teasing grin. "So . . . last night was . . . what?"

"A warm up." She jerked her head, beckoning to him, then turned and trotted over to pull out a couple of mats. "Come on, old man. You don't want to lose your touch, do you?"

He chuckled, watching her for another few seconds. Even from there, he could make out the ripple of her lean, corded muscles. She'd never put any weight back on after Mercy's birth, so her spine and joints jutted sharply through her skin. His plates loosened, and he dragged his eyes away from her, not wanting to walk into the shuttle bay with an obvious issue.

"I'm waiting," she called, dropping her voice to a register that just complicated his issues. For a second, he considered hitting the control to go up to their cabin and telling her if she wanted a workout, she'd have to come to him. Instead, he headed down to the shuttle bay, undoing the fasteners down the length of his tunic.

"Where's my _Praela_?" he called as he stepped out of the elevator, oscillating his subvocals. Mercy's answering giggles guided him over to the back end of the Kodiak. "There she is."

"Hey, Garrus," Steve called. "She's giving me a hand."

Garrus grinned. "At this rate, she's going to end up a techie like her mari and pari." He bent over her little reclining chair. "But I think she wants to be a musician." After unclipping her harness, he lifted her up, nuzzling her velvet soft, dusky little cheeks. "It's pretty cool of you to help Steve with his work when you could be wrestling with your mari."

Mercy laughed and reached up, grabbing his lower mouth plate in her fist.

"Oh no, she's got me." He mouthed her fingers a little. "She was saving all her skills to take me down with the ancient bottom jaw hold." Laughing he pulled her in tight to nuzzle her again. "I surrender." Closing his eyes, he pressed his cheek lightly against hers, savouring the soft whisper of her breath next to his aural canal, the warmth of her, the impossible silkiness of her hair.

"Vakarian, are you afraid I'm going to kick your butt?" Shepard called, a teasing smile singing through her words.

"Terrified." He nuzzled Mercy's cheek again and laid her down in her chair. "I'd better go, beautiful, let your mother beat up on me for a while." He buckled her in. "You show Steve how to do . . . whatever it is he's doing." He pulled off his gloves and brushed his talons over her hair, then straightened and pulled off his tunic.

"Good grief, Vakarian," Shepard called, dancing from foot to foot on the mat. "You are getting slow in your old age."

He threw his tunic over the console and laid his gloves on top. "You're pretty cocky for someone who's been laid out so many times."

She coughed, spreading her shoulders and sticking out her elbows, bulking out all the muscles in her neck. Punching a fist into her opposite hand, she cracked her neck and made a hilariously exaggerated angry face. "Bring it on, twinkletoes. Prepare to feel the pain."

"I haven't seen you outside of bed for three days . . .." He threw a left-handed blow, drawing her defenses away from the right side of her body, then spun and landed a solid kick, knocking her back. ". . . and this is how you choose to spend what little time we have. Smack talking . . . badly, by the way . . . and throwing one another around in the cargo bay." He cocked a brow plate.

Shepard laughed and ducked under his blow, flowing through a loose somersault into a crouch, her right leg sweeping around to take out his legs. "Come on," she teased, "you haven't had to babysit your crazy wife for five months or so. It's got to be a relief to have some time to yourself."

Garrus hopped over her leg, landing slightly off balance. In the fraction of a second it took to recover, Shepard barreled into him, throwing him onto his back. She straddled his waist, her hands on his shoulders, and smiled down into his eyes.

Instead of striking back, Garrus let out a long breath and sank into the mat.

"What?" Shepard asked, brow knitting into lines of concern. "What's wrong, Garrus? Just not into sparring today? You don't have to. You get carte blanche to say no to the admiral." She leaned down, her forearms crossed over his keel. "Are you worried about what happens once we arrive?"

Sitting up, he crossed his legs, leaving her on his lap. "It hasn't been a relief, Shepard." He stared into her eyes. "Yes, I'm glad you're rediscovering your drive and strength, but it's been lonely." Chuckling, he tried to strip the edge off his words, but he pulled it off about as gracefully as an elcor gymnast.

She laid both hands inside the front of his cowl. "Lonely?" Letting out a heavy, almost exasperated sigh, she leaned forward, resting her brow against his scars. "I've been obsessed. Didn't see it. Why haven't you said anything, Garrus?"

Bobbing his head in a slight shrug, he leaned back, bracing his hands against the mat. "We're going to be apart most of the time once we arrive, Shepard. I need to get used to the fact that you're not going to be there whenever I want to see you, or touch you." He ran his talons through her hair, brushing the sweaty strands from her forehead. "I'm worried that the time we do get together will be eaten up by vid calls, messages, and extranet searches, with charts, maps, and tactical plans. All the things that you've buried yourself in since we left Earth."

Soft fingers skated along his mandible, barely warming the hide as they passed over it. "Okay." Her voice drifted out, just audible and as gentle as her touch. "When we see what our schedules are, we make sure we have a good block of time each day that's just for the three of us. I'll give more of the maintenance-type tasks to Liara." She leaned into him, resting her body against his as she kissed him. "Okay?"

She let out another of the deep sighs. "If you need something from me, you need to tell me, Garrus. Especially now." She shook her head. "You know how I am when I get focused on something. I'll try, but I'm going to fail now and again unless you're there to pull me back." Soft kisses trailed along his mandible. "I'll try my best to do better."

He sat up, wrapping her in his arms. "I've been damned lucky these past couple of cycles, and a big part of me doesn't want to leave this ship, Shepard. My life did an about face for the better when I came aboard her." He lifted her off his lap and stood, not giving her time to react. "Come on, we just have time for a shower." Wrapping his hand around her slender fingers, he led the way to the elevator.

Shepard squeezed his hand before letting go to get Mercy, tossing his tunic and gloves to him as she passed the console. He shrugged into the tunic and hit the elevator control, watching his mate joking with Steve.

Guilt boiled down deep in his guts. His children deserved a home, friends their own age, a settled existence. They deserved to find favourite places to hide away from everyone to read and watch the sky. They deserved everything he had growing up, well, with the addition of a loving, present father. He wanted them to have all that and so much more, but still . . . he felt like an agoraphobic being dragged kicking and screaming out under the impossibly huge and terrifying sky.

Shepard walked up, Mercy held in one arm, the chair thing in the other. Her smile felt like sunshine on his face as she leaned up to kiss him. "Come on, handsome. Onward and upward."

"Onward and upward."

He never had been very good with change.

* * *

Less than an hour later, the _Normandy_ glided into dock.

"Wow." Shepard whistled. "They've been working their butts off. Look at this place."

"Arriving in style this time, Admiral," Joker agreed.

Garrus stared out the ports at the massive glass, steel, and concrete structure. He'd helped organize the project from the _Normandy_, he and Adrien working out most of the construction details over the QEC, but still, the finished product overwhelmed him. A giant crescent, it wrapped around nearly a thousand acres of docks and warehouses along the edge of the new academy grounds.

"I've never seen anything like it," Kaidan said, a low whistle following his words.

"Palaven is going to be a galactic hub for the next decade, perhaps even longer, depending on how quickly the Citadel is rebuilt," Sparatus said from the doorway. "It's fitting to make a magnificent first impression on visitors."

Shepard jumped and turned to face the councillor. Garrus covered a chuckle as she recovered from the start and smiled. Despite five months together inside a small metal tube, Shepard still jumped every time Sparatus came into the room. "Glad to be home, sir?" she asked.

He nodded, just a slight tremor. "It's been too long. One loses his priorities too long away from the land he came from."

Garrus almost asked if the councillor had family waiting, but, like Shepard, he found it nearly impossible to just talk to Sparatus despite his recent support. Too much bad blood over too long for any real trust to develop, he supposed. Perhaps in time.

"Well," Shepard called, "enough staring. Let's go." She pushed through the small crowd, striding down the length of the CIC with just enough stiffness in her spine for Garrus to know that she felt nearly as terrified as he did.

"Why did we decide to jump off cliffs so high?" he whispered as they stepped into the elevator.

Shepard chuckled, her shoulders dropping a little. "It wouldn't be us if we weren't scrambling to throw together a parachute on the way down."

He slipped a hand down her spine, feeling her relax under his touch. "Yeah. We may want to rethink that strategy some day soon."

They picked Mercy up in med bay, Shepard tucking their daughter into a wrap that cradled her snugly against her mother's heart. Shepard paused at the elevator, her hand over the control to send them down to the shuttle bay, but not pressing it.

Garrus put his arm around her waist and held her tight against his side. "Onward and upward."

She nodded and hit the control.

Before they even reached the end of the _Normandy_'s ramp, Gira hurried from the terminal, ignoring the dock workers who tried to keep her back. She waved, grinning wide and happy as she ran up to Shepard, trying to hug her and look at the baby all at the same time.

"I'm so glad to see you," Shepard said, her voice tight, tears making her eyes glassy as she hugged the elder female. "I've missed you."

"And I, you. Since Rossus passed, your vid calls have been such a comfort, but there's no substitute for face to face." She clasped Garrus's elbows and touched brows. "Welcome home, Garrus." She embraced Herros and Sol, then rubbed her talons together. "All right, that's enough of that. Pass her over."

Shepard laughed. "That's how it's going to be now, Garrus. Everywhere we go, it's going to be. Nice to see you. Now, where's the baby?" She extricated Mercy from her wrap and placed her in Gira's arms.

Garrus wondered how Mercy would react to a complete stranger, but his _praela_ just stared up at Gira with those wise, blue eyes, then reached up to grab the female's mandible.

"Hierarch Vakarian?

Garrus nodded.

"Cipritine Docking Authority. You're registered as the vessel's XO? Permission to come aboard and make arrangements for cargo inspection?"

"Certainly." Garrus waved him up. "I'll get you together with our procurement and supplies officer." He led the way back up to the top of the ramp. "Lt. Cortez?"

"What in sweet spirits is this?" a dual-toned voice called over the noise of the docks.

Garrus alerted to the aggression in the tone and spun around.

A turian in construction gear strode over, pushing in on Shepard, reaching up to rub a rough thumb against the marking over Shepard's nose and cheekbones. "You think you're turian, pink meat sack?" He looked down at Mercy. "You trying to make your whelp turian too?" He jerked back when he saw Mercy's face. "What in buratrum is that?"

Garrus broke away from his discussion with the port authority and ran down the ramp, but before he even got close, Shepard passed Mercy back to Gira. Spinning around, she took the turian worker down with two lightning punches to the lower gut.

"You dare touch me - manhandle me - without my permission? You dare come near my child?" She waited for him to stagger to his feet, then shoved one thumb under his chin plate, lifting him onto his talon tips. "You make a mistake like coming near my child again, you'll find out just how much damage a pink meat sack can do in under fifteen seconds. Is that understood?" He danced a little, struggling to hold his balance, his talons grabbing her forearm.

Garrus stepped up beside her, watching Shepard's face. Still and silent, even her chest barely moving, suddenly Garrus knew exactly what Victus saw when he looked at Jane. A _praela_ stood before him, as scorching and airless as the shimmer off a midday desert.

"Shepard?" He took another step, not at all sure whether or not the woman most known for compassion in the face of violence would press that tiny bit harder and kill an unarmed worker. She tilted her head, gaze steady on the worker's but closed, giving nothing away as the seconds dragged on and the docks held their breath.

"Jane." Adrien Victus strode out of the terminal, a squad of guards on his heels. "Sorry, Admiral Shepard, we should have been here early, had security in place."

Shepard held the turian worker on his toes, but then the winds scattered the heat, and she smiled at the primarch. "Hey, Adrien, it's good to see you." She looked around the docks, at all the people staring. "It's okay, I think this little demonstration has made a much more effective statement than a squad of security."

Victus chuckled and nodded, laying a companionable hand on her shoulder. "People never remember the deadliest woman in the galaxy part." He looked over at Garrus, a warm smile accompanying a nod. "Hierarch Vakarian, welcome home."

"Thank you, Primarch. It's good to be home." Garrus watched the worker's eyes as the magnitude of his mistake registered. It would have been amusing but for the moment of uncertainty he'd felt.

Shepard let her prisoner down to stand flat-footed and stared into his eyes. "Let's get introduced in a more civil way, shall we?" She smiled, but it didn't manage to spread past the curve of her lips. "My name is Admiral Jane Shepard, that very angry looking turian right there . . .." She nodded toward Garrus. ". . . is my bond-mate, and that beautiful little girl is our baby."

The smile bled away as Garrus stepped up beside her. "If you come within ten metres of me or my family again, I won't just put you down with a cheap shot to your sensitive bits, I'll pull them out. If my bond-mate is with me, you won't need to worry about those pesky little bits of your anatomy ever again." This time her smile lit up her face with a mania that had terrified Garrus a long time ago, in another life.

The worker swallowed hard, but said nothing, his death-watch gaze riveted to Shepard.

She released him then wiped her fingers on her trouser leg. Two breaths, and that calm, searing deadliness dropped away, his wife turning to Victus with a huge smile, wrapping her arms around her friend in a heartfelt hug.

Garrus let out a long breath and shook his head. It had all just been crazy Shepard. The last time crazy Shepard came out to play, she nearly broke her forehead open on Gatatog Uvenk's head casing. Hiding a wry smile, he realized that he'd sort of missed her. Shepard looked like she had a horn for the better part of two weeks after Grunt's rite.

"You are looking so good," Shepard said, holding the primarch by his shoulders. After a moment, they walked over to Gira, their conversation moving on to how adorable, intelligent, and talented Mercy was.

If it hadn't been for the worker glaring at Shepard's back as though he wished he carried a gun, Garrus would have dismissed the entire incident. The worker straightened, hate-filled eyes looking to Garrus.

"You mate with a human and call yourself fit to lead your people?" He spat at Garrus's feet and spun away, just to smack face first into a wall of pink armour.

"You don't want to do that again, daisy." A tough, gravelly voice rumbled over them like thunder. The krogan gave the worker a little shove, then strode over to Garrus and offered his hand.

"Ravenor Barl," Garrus gripped the battlemaster's wrist. "I hear you volunteered for our family's protection service." He gestured toward the terminal, inviting the krogan to join him as he followed the others.

"Someone has to look after you and your mate. Figured since I have some practice at it anyway, I might as well put it to good use." Barl laughed, a sharp varren bark of sound. "Besides, saves me having to go back to Tuchanka and fulfil all the breeding contracts my fat aunt arranged the moment you lot cured the genophage." He shuddered. "If it were up to her, my equipment would fall off siring the half of Tuchanka that Urdnot Wrex hasn't."

Garrus gave him an awkward smile and nodded. "Well, we're glad to have you."

They moved to the shuttle without incident, the workers and passengers backing away both in deference to the Primarch's presence and fear of his rather ominous companion. Shepard sat between Gira, who held Mercy, and Victus.

The second the door shut, Shepard turned to face the Primarch. "Did you hear from the port authorities on Sur'kesh? Did they find anything in their searches?"

The Primarch shook his head and placed a hand on her arm. "Sorry, Shepard, but no. They found no sign that Lenka had ever been aboard any of the ships."

Shepard sighed and nodded, deflating a little. After a moment, Garrus saw her shake it off. "You got initial scouting reports on those locations we alerted on?" Mercy began to cry, so Shepard turned to accept her back from Gira. She kissed the baby's face, making slurpy noises until she laughed, and nestled her back inside her wrap. As soon as Mercy settled, Shepard looked back to Victus.

He nodded. "Yes, and we can have raids ready to go within a couple of days. We should give things a few days to settle, let them find somewhere and relax in."

"And the docking authority searches here? All the ships are being searched prior to deboarding?"

Garrus let out a long breath. He wanted Lenka back more than anything. He just wished he didn't feel as though it would cost him his mate to retrieve his daughter.


	3. Chapter 3

**(A-N:** At long last, Shepard finally let me into her personal hell. Thank you for your patience with us both.)

**Torin: ** A male turian of the age of majority. Equivalent of man.

**Tarin:** A female turian of the age of majority. Equivalent of woman.

**July 28, 2188**

_Don't look into their eyes._

_Keep moving._

Shepard flew through the base, a guided missile; numb and focused as she shoved past the beatific Apostles. Despite doing her best to ignore Balak's thralls, their beatitude closed a clammy fist around her that set slugs crawling under her skin . . . and a thin, molten wire of envy burrowing through her guts. What wouldn't she give for even a single moment of pure, blissfully ignorant happiness?

She shoved the covetous whispers into a dusty back corner of her mind, fixating on rooting out the Leviathan artifacts and blowing them, and their lies, to hell. False happiness and purpose amounted to an ash-pile of lies, and lies only caused pain. The raids, destroying the artifacts, saved the awakened from that pain.

_Then why do their faces always look like I've torn the sun from their sky when they awake?_

Salvation often came hard and painful. No one knew that better than Shepard.

"Why?" One of the awakened shoved her face into Shepard's, a blur of sorrow and rage. "Why would you steal our light and hope just to imprison us back in this?" She held her hands out, stabbing them out at what remained of her planet. "What sort of monster rips people from paradise just to throw them back into hell?"

Shepard wrenched herself away, pushing through the living quarters, each step faster than the one before. Bulldozing her way past the believers offering comfort and the awakened demanding answers, she sank hook-like claws into the rightness of her mission, clinging to it with desperate gravity. Gaze unable to rest anywhere without doubt staring back at her, she drove herself harder and faster, always moving faster, willing the endless sea of faces behind a soup-thick fog of denial.

Guided missile; get the job done. Destroy the artifacts, wake up the sleepers, make it too painful for Balak to keep Lenka: a good, solid plan. A plan anchored in doing the right thing for everyone. She was Jane Shepard; she did the right thing, no matter the cost.

_Only one bloody snag in your perfect, righteous plan, Shepard._

Try as she might to pass by the children, keeping her burning eyes focused on the opposite wall - she knew Lenka was not among them - she stopped to look into the face of each and every one. Turian eyes looked back - frightened, curious, angry, heartbroken . . . but always turian. Each set broke her heart anew, each feeding the black hole that growled and snapped at the center of her.

_None of them are Lenka. They're all turian. Don't torture yourself._

She used the children to whip herself onward. Surely, if salvation lay anywhere, it lay in pushing forward, remaining in perpetual motion, focusing on the mission: destroy artifacts, seize assets, get Lenka back. Destroy artifacts, seize assets, get Lenka back. Looking into the children's eyes paved a road that dropped into the abyss - the deep, dark hole at her core - and yet hope kept her dancing along its event horizon. God-damned hope wrestled aside reason and self-preservation, even sanity, forcing her to stare into each and every face, hoping for four, black eyes, suffering a small death every time only two stared back.

After the first couple of raids, Garrus tried to convince her to stay behind, to keep in contact with the ops via radio.

"You don't need to go, Shepard. Please, stop torturing yourself." He tried to shelter her, to build walls of warmth and love around her, to wrap her in comfort.

She didn't deserve it. She'd broken all of her promises.

_"I'm never letting you go." A soft sigh chased the words from Shepard's mouth._

_"Never?" Lenka giggled._

_"Never ever." She leaned in to kiss the child's cheek, inhaling the clean, soapy scent of her. "I luv yah," she whispered. "And you'll never have to be afraid again, because I'm never going to let anyone hurt you. I promise."_

_Lenka kissed her back. "I luv yah."_

Shepard gave her head a sharp, hard shake. She needed to go, to be the one to look into every cranny and search every set of eyes. If she didn't, doubt would drive her mad. If her mate's mandibles dropped and his back bowed a little further every time she demolished his fortifications of love and threw off his comfort . . ..

Destroy artifacts, seize assets, get Lenka back. The universe would tilt back onto its axis, and she'd make it up to him. Then she'd deserve to return to the warmth.

_It's ego, you know? This idea that only you can make sure it's all done right is pure ego. It's arrogance, an arrogance that cost you Lenka and nearly cost you Mercy. What else will it cost you before it's all said and done?_

She finished sweeping the basement level and ran up a fight of concrete stairs, taking two at a time. A bitter nettle laugh crumbled to dust as it left her lips. Either option, going along or staying behind left her sinking into the darkness in the end.

She found the second artifact in a small alcove on the first floor. Five bullets blew it to hell and more sleepers awoke.

"Where are we? What have you done? Why? What do we do now? Where do we go? Why? Why did you destroy everything?"

Shepard bullied her way through the growing, desperate, terrified throng, leaving it to the rest of the team to deal with them. Destroy artifacts, seize assets, get Lenka back. She was Jane Shepard. She did what was right, no matter the cost.

Going along or staying behind: unless she found Lenka and soon, everything ended in a darkness so terrible she couldn't force herself to look at it. Even after months of searching, she'd found no way to reconcile the two halves of her life. As Garrus and Mercy wrapped her in warmth and love, the other half screamed, tearing her apart with the wordless shrieks of a child in pain.

No, that was a lie. Every part of her dwelt in fear and anger, drowning in a hatred so deep she felt raped by it. When she held her baby, yes, love filled and warmed her - beautiful, sunshine-bright love as deep and broad as all creation poured into her until she felt as though she'd explode with it - but quills of resentment worked their way in, barbs burrowing into her soul until their poison infected everything. The love wanted her to forget the fear and uncertainty. It wanted her to turn her back on the part of her tied to Lenka . . . to just be happy. How could she not hate it?

Third floor. Another artifact. More eyes stared into her, demanding and pleading, but she flung them back, shouldering through them, faster and harder with each step. She needed to get out. The place choked her, pressing in on her with yet another failure until her pulse felt as though it would explode out her throat and temples, spraying everything in thick, toxic icor. Surely no one with so much hatred inside them could claim blood still flowed through their veins.

The raid resulted in four destroyed artifacts, one hundred and twenty four awakened Apostles, and information leading to four bank or investment accounts.

As soon as she checked the last corner of the last room, Shepard spun and fled, running down through the structure, her last reserves of control drying up. Anything in her way met with a forearm or shoulder, shoved aside and left where it -

they

- fell.

Shepard burst out the door into near dark and hit the environmental controls on her armour, dropping the temperature a couple more degrees. She flipped open the visor, breaking the sealed in claustrophobia like cracking open a tomb. Gasping, she stumbled into the nearest wall, her armour crunching musically against the concrete.

A breeze curled through her hair and whispered across her cheeks, cooling her skin and easing the black panic enough for her to stand. She pushed away from the wall and wandered into the darkness. The shuttle settled to ground twenty metres away, so she stumbled that direction, sliding a finger into the rigid collar of her armour, tugging at it.

She couldn't remain inside the base after the initial sweep: too many Apostles, all of their madness focused on her. The awakened stabbed her with stiletto-sharp accusations and questions, while the true believers bludgeoned her with adulation. After the first raid, being torn back and forth between their rage and their fawning drove her to the point where she'd buried her fist in a young _torin's_ face. Months of terrified impotency and resentment exploded in glorious release, and for a moment, as she laughed hysterical and thready, she knew peace.

The next second, terror and horror had evicted the sadistic pleasure, and her laughter turned to retching. Her stomach heaved until she collapsed, her body trying to purge a darkness that refused to be displaced so easily. In the end, Garrus had picked her up off the ground and carried her to the shuttle while she shook so hard her teeth chattered.

Looking up, she saw that she'd missed the shuttle and turned back. "This is never who I was," she whispered into the darkness. "Daddy? God? Anyone? This is not who I am."

"How're you doing, Missus?" a rough voice called from the door.

Shepard jumped a little, then turned to face the massive figure blocking the light from the doorway. Blinking slowly, she nodded, just a single dip of her head, grateful to the krogan for dragging her out of her self-pitying quagmire. "Fine, Barl. Go back in, and help Garrus get things wrapped up. It's getting late."

The krogan battlemaster chuckled, a low rumble like an engine. "Work day tomorrow. Does he have a curfew?"

Shepard let out an acerbic grunt. "You're about to get one, buttercup."

His laugh thundered out the door as he lumbered back inside.

A glimmer of light out in the rubble captured her attention. It flickered on the upslope toward the eastern residential district then disappeared. Something whispered in the back of her head, telling her that a shadow hid behind the innocuous flash. It pulled her into the detritus to get a better angle, insisting she investigate. Shrugging her Mattock into her hands, she used its scope to zoom in. Still nothing.

She shouldered her rifle, sitting on a broken chunk of wall so she could keep an eye on the light's origin, and lifted a foot to rest on a girder. Using her omnitool, she opened a channel to Gira's home.

"Jane." The _tarin_ smiled. "Just checking in?"

"Yeah, we're just about done here." She dropped her gaze to the small screen and tried to smooth the folds between her eyebrows. "How's the biscuit doing?"

Gira disappeared for a moment, reappearing with Mercy cradled in her arms. The baby yawned and stuffed a hand into her mouth. "She's fine. Drank her bottle, and I'm pretty sure I got a couple of spoonfuls of the porridge and fruit into her." Gira chuckled. "As a side note, we both look wonderful in purple."

A worn smile stretched Shepard's lips. "Yeah, she wears her rice and fruit well." She kissed her fingers and touched them to the baby's cheek. "We'll be back within the hour, I'd imagine. Thanks, Gira."

"See you soon. I'll make sure there's a pot of tea." The _tarin_ lifted a hand, then looked down, already talking to the baby.

"Thanks." Shepard's lips thinned again, and she closed the channel.

She lifted her other foot up onto the girder and rested her folded arms on her knees, eyes scanning the rubble once more. The flash could have been anything: a predator's eyes glancing her way, someone moving a light inside that happened to catch glass, even someone moving down in the settlement. She nodded. It could have been, and yet, she felt someone out there, watching.

"Shepard." Garrus stepped out the door and strode over to her. "We're just about done in there. Same as the other bases, most of the awakened have no where else to go, so are staying until they can find something." He looked over toward the rubble, following her stare. "What is it?"

She stood slowly. "I saw something over there, a flash of light. It might have been nothing, but my gut says scope."

He shrugged his Mantis into his hands and lifted it to his eye. "I don't see . . .."

Shepard caught the firefly blink in the rubble even before she heard the terrible axe-crack of a bullet splitting the air like dry maple. She slammed into Garrus, driving him to the ground. Chunks of rubble scored a symphony of bruises up her right side. Shoving aside Garrus's pained grunt and her body's own complaints, she leaped to her feet. Pulling her Mattock, she sprinted into the dark, weaving around and hurdling refuse. A shadow moved in the dark, and she opened fire, the metallic clatter of her assault rifle backed up by the harsh cough of a shotgun. The shadow stumbled.

A bellow roared up the slope after her, "Be careful, Missus!" The thunder of running krogan chased after her.

Slowing to walk the last few metres, Shepard saw a male turian draped over a chunk of concrete. He shifted and groaned, a hand scrabbling in the grime, trying to locate his weapon. Shepard swung her Mattock, spinning the gun in her hand to smash the butt into the shooter's arm. The black hole inside her howled with glee as the turian bellowed.

The shooter rolled over, flopping onto his back. He stared up at her, eyes wide with hatred and no small amount of fear. Shepard raised the Mattock above her head, her jaw set and teeth clenched. The impact of the impending blow crooned to the bones in her arms; the hollow, smashed-coconut sound his head would make sang in her ears. Her every muscle poised, the black hole purred with anticipation, promising so much pleasure, so much peace in its seductive whisper.

"He's dead," Barl said from behind her. A strong hand plucked the Mattock from her numb fingers. Arms still raised, she stared down into eyes that watched the sky but no longer saw it.

Her arms dropped, every bone and muscle fiber turning to water. She stumbled forward as Barl holstered her Mattock none too gently. Her knees almost gave out, but that jolt shattered the last of the dissociation, settling herself back into her skin.

"Got a bit of the blood rage in you, don't you, Missus?" he asked, his warm rumble assuring her he knew how the whispers sang to her in that moment.

She turned to face the krogan. As surely as if someone else had taken over her body, the rage and seductive call of violence dissipated.

Garrus.

Shaking herself, she looked up and called out into the night, "Garrus?" Her blood froze, every molecule in her reaching out, straining for an answer, yet she couldn't force herself to take a step toward him. What if she hadn't moved quickly enough?

"I'm okay. He just winged me." In the wedge of gold spilling across the ground from the base door, she saw her husband stand and brush himself off. She let out a shuddering breath.

"Well, damn. The Apostles have never carried guns." Barl turned to look over the destruction. "Too many damned places for snipers to hide in this city if they're going to start shooting at us."

"Go cover Garrus, and get some bodies up here to process the area." Shepard crouched at the dead shooter's side. She scanned the_ torin's_ famila notas with her omnitool, then turned to his clothing. Inside his pockets she found a small holo of a female and child. No ID or currency. He carried the only thing to his death that mattered to him, which meant that he'd come knowing how close that spectre loomed over his shoulder.

Garrus walked up through the rubble to join her. "He could have been aiming for either one of us, Shepard. Probably TPR, or hired by them." When he reached her side, he looked down and shook his head, a single drop of blood shaking loose to sail through the air, splashing just under Shepard's eye.

She jumped up, flinging the chill splatter from her skin with a flick of her hand. Too many times she'd worn her husband's blood on her skin. Never again.

A reassuring hand weighed down her shoulder. "Come on, let's send his body and gear to be analyzed and get home."

She looked into Garrus's eyes, her eyebrows collapsing into a sad and tired frown, her gaze turning to the blue-black line shining on her glove. As grateful as she was to him for trying to deflect, she was certain of the gunman's target.

Shepard reached up, her hand brushing his cheek, her voice low and grave when she spoke. "He could have been after either one of us, but he wasn't. I sat out here for ten minutes without him twitching a muscle. He didn't fire until you came out."

Looking out over the valley, she shuddered. The city gave her chills, like a mouse in a maze filled with snakes, unable to see what was coming around the next corner.

She pushed down the uneasiness and nodded, reaching out to press her hand to his chest. "You're right, though. Let's get back to the house." She set out ahead of him, knowing that he would return to the base to assign people to ensuring the shooter and scene were taken care of.

None of that mattered. The shooter had gone in without ID, sacrificing himself for something. Revenge? Hope of a better future for a family left behind? All that mattered was that his rifle had been aimed at her husband. TPR. The pack of cowardly bastards. Not an ounce of honour amongst them. Not if they came at her babies and her mate instead of striking at her directly.

She popped the hatch on the shuttle and sat, leaning against the far side, her head resting against the cool metal. Her eyes closed, each eyelid feeling lined with sandpaper and weighed down with boulders. She dozed as she waited, drifting in and out of a clammy, liminal fog. When Garrus sat beside her and pulled her into his arms, she roused enough to shift, resting her head in the curve between his cowl and pauldron, before fading back out.

The forest spread before her, her heart dropping into the leaf litter when she saw the familiar, endless trunks. "Come on. Damn it, Balak. I thought we were past this crap. You can send me a message through the FTL comm routes now."

Shadows darted through the trees, moving so quickly that they kicked up dirt and leaves in their wake. She allowed them to race around her peripherals without reacting to them, waiting for Balak to make his game clear.

"Shepard?" Garrus's voice echoed from a distance. "Shepard! Where are you?"

A thunderous report sliced through the dead air. She looked up, expecting lightning, but no. No, the sound cracked too sharp for thunder. A rifle.

"Garrus?" She screamed so loud her voice cut out, rasping through her lips.

She spun, trying to discern the direction of the shot, the echo coming from too many directions. "Garrus? Where are you?" Straining to hear even the slightest sound, Shepard felt as though she'd gone deaf. Not even her feet made noise as they shuffled in the leaf litter, ready to run at the slightest hint.

_Please, let me find him. He can't be here alone. They'll tear him to pieces._

At last, a faint groan opened a path, and she leaped into a sprint, plunging over undergrowth and roots, dodging tree trunks. Heartbeat frantic, pulse pounding too loud in her ears to hear over, she searched.

Sliding to a stop, going down on one hip as her boot slid in the damp compost under the leaves, Shepard bounced back up, lungs heaving. Holding her breath, she spun first one direction, then another, not sure if she could even hear him over the drum chorus banging inside her head.

"Garrus?"

"Mommy!"

"Lenka?" Whirling, Shepard pinwheeled her arms, nearly tipping onto her face before she caught her balance. "Lenka? Where are you, sweetie?"

A shriek rose shrill and terrified over the silence, the terror in the scream slicing Shepard open from head to foot. "Mommy! Help me."

Glancing back at her previous path, Shepard bounced on the balls of her feet, weight shifting one way then the other before she took off toward Lenka's scream.

"Keep calling me, baby." She breathed a silent prayer for Garrus, a tether forming between them as she left him behind. Every step she took pulled the line tighter, until she could no longer run. Leaning forward, she pulled with all her strength, her boots digging trenches in the earth as she fought to reach her daughter.

"Lenka?" She stopped, her wind broken, lungs burning. Choking on the air - it tasted and smelled like acid - she covered her mouth only to find her hand covered in blood when she pulled it back. "Lenka?" Another choking fit followed her cry. When it eased, she listened.

"Shepard."

She spun back the way she'd come at the weak tremor on the breeze. "Garrus?"

The angry, air raid siren squall of a baby crying rose above the sighing of the forest, its pitch alone sending Shepard racing in a third direction. As she took her first step, a tight cord snapped into being, tethering her to Lenka. It held so tight that she only managed a couple of steps before she couldn't move. Struggling, she turned back to Lenka, but a third shackle formed, tying her to Mercy's cry.

Bringing all of her strength to bear, Shepard fought to get free, hands ripping at the tethers, but unable to break any of them. No matter what direction she moved, the other two tightened until they threatened to yank her into three pieces.

"Balak! What is this, Balak? Let me go. This is insane. You can't just keep torturing me!"

Her heart fell, knowing that he very well could. He could break her into endless pieces, and then still grind her into sand until nothing remained but a shell that couldn't remember what light or love used to mean.

"Mommy! Mommy, please. Help me!" The scream rose to shrill, whimpering sobs.

Shepard threw herself against her bindings. "I'm trying baby. I'm coming."

With a mind-shattering snap, the tether holding her to Lenka broke, throwing Shepard face-first into the dirt, the child's screams cutting off as though someone had slammed a door between them.

Shepard scrambled up, the other two cords pulling tighter, dragging her over the forest floor until they held her immobile between them once more. "Lenka!" Her throat tightened, her screams coming out shrill and choked with tears. "Lenka! No! Please, baby, answer me."

"Which one next, Shepard?" a voice asked, deeper and more terrible than Balak's. "Which one next?"

Shepard jumped up, stumbling forward into the bulkhead, her scream still echoing off the inside of the shuttle.

"Shepard?"

She spun toward the warm voice, her hands reaching out, scrabbling against the cool metal as she tried to keep her balance. "Garrus?" She tried to take a step, but her knee gave out then snap-locked.

He slid forward on his seat and held out both hands, one closing around her closest hand, the other supporting her waist. "It was a dream, Shepard." He tugged her back over and eased her into her seat, pulling her tight against his side. Turning into her, he wrapped both arms around her and rested his brow on the top of her head.

Breathing shallow and faint, her mind reeling, Shepard nodded a little. "A dream." She closed her eyes and inhaled, using the familiar spicy cloves, gun oil, and polymer scent of him to pull her the rest of the way out into the real world.

"Which one next, Shepard?" that voice whispered through her thoughts. "You know which one is next, don't you? The target is already painted."

Pressing her brow in against the warm, rough hide of his neck, she felt the slow, solid pulse of his heart pounding against her temple and bit her teeth down on her bottom lip to keep it from shaking. Eyes burning with molten tears, she forced the bellows of her diaphragm to remained steady, wrestling down the hitching spasms that tried to throw her into sobbing.

_Just a dream._

Except, of course it wasn't. Lenka was gone, and hungry-snake tendrils of orange smoke wound around Garrus wherever he went. Long, barbed skewers pierced her stomach, pressing down through the rest of her guts, the pain sharp enough that she had to clench her teeth to keep from moaning.

His voice a gentle caress, Garrus said, "We're back at the house, Shepard." Despite his words, he didn't loosen his grip on her, content to hold her until she broke the contact, which she did, abruptly jumping to her feet.

Shepard winced as her elbow smacked into his jaw, but she didn't pause, just said, "Yeah, let's go." She strode to the shuttle hatch, flinging it up, and leaping down, but she only made it to the edge of the patch of tarmac before she stalled.

Garrus bypassed her, his hurt and confusion billowing around him, the pale ghosts of all his hopes manifesting to remind her of her failings.

"I think we were wrong, Garrus." She lined her toes up with the edge of the parking space, not allowing the soles of her boots to touch the living turf. "You were right before the last battle. We should have retired somewhere a long way from all of this."

He stopped with his hand on the door control, not turning to face her. "So, we should what? Tell everyone, 'sorry, but now that we've seen how badly we're needed, we've decided to slink off into retirement somewhere'?"

Shoulders rising and falling, letting his sarcasm roll off, Shepard tilted her head and shrugged. "What's so wrong with living quietly somewhere and just raising our kids?"

He spun, his talons digging divots out of the lawn, halving the distance between them in a stride. "You know that we'll never find a place where the galaxy won't follow us. That's what we signed on for. You went into the war and made the choices you made knowing that the consequences would follow you." His brow plates shot up as if something just occurred to him. "You knew that, didn't you?"

She sniffed in a harsh breath and looked to her left, avoiding his stare. "Did you?"

He closed the rest of distance in another stride. "Yes, Shepard. I've taken every step along this path aware that as the most visible person standing behind you, I was making myself a target. When we decided to have kids, I knew I'd spend the rest of my life throwing myself in front of them every time there was a loud bang." He reached up to touch her shoulder.

Shepard ducked back from his hand, shaking her head. She didn't know what would happen if he touched her right then. All she had room inside her to feel was the way the cord tying her to Lenka had snapped, and how being pulled between them kept her from reaching any of them. If it had been the cord to Garrus that snapped . . ..

_Which one next, Shepard?_

"I told you months ago that you would never escape death or having to make the hard choices, Shepard. It kills me to watch you go through the aftermath, because you refuse to let me carry any of the burden." Lunging a little, he grabbed her shoulders, his thumbs stroking along the seam between her chest guard and pauldrons.

Try as she might to keep it strong and steady, Garrus's caress along those chinks in her armour made her breathing hitch. Her words forced their way out past the sudden, agonizing pressure in her sinuses and throat. "Not you."

Bending, putting their eyes at a level, Garrus pulled his gloves off and asked, "What do you mean?" He pressed his hand against her cheek. "Shepard?"

She pulled away for a couple of heartbeats, but then the heat of his hand, the aliveness of him pulled her in, and she pressed her face against the calloused talons. "They're using the people I love against me. I can't sacrifice you or Mercy to some overblown sense of responsibility." She laid her hand over his. "I can't change the galaxy, Garrus. At least, I'm not the only one who can."

Unable to stand the warmth or contact any longer, she twisted away from him. She let out a couple of soft, moaning breaths and walked toward the door. "I won't sacrifice you or Mercy to my ego."

His voice carried over her shoulder. "That's a load of varren crap, and you know it." His talons gripped her wrist, the polymer of her undersuit burning the skin as he pulled her back, spinning her to face him. "You were the only one who could stop the Reapers. Balak and the Leviathan are only after you now because you are the one thing standing in the way of whatever the hell they're doing."

Shaking her head, fast and violent, Shepard reached up and snapped the seals on her chest guard, tearing it away. "Am I never allowed to be finished, Garrus? I've lost Lenka because I'm standing in their way. I almost lost Mercy because I'm standing in their way." She wrenched her wrist from his grip and yanked off her glove. Reaching up, she pressed her fingertips into the furrow cut through his fringe. "And this?" A black, fanged satisfaction rolled through her as he flinched away in pain. She held her fingers in front of his face, stained with his blood. "Do I lose you as well?"

He snatched her hand out of the air and pressed the backs of her fingers to his mouth. "Shepard, we can do a lot of good in this world, in this galaxy. We can and will get Lenka back. Don't let this darkness take your heart."

She pulled away and hit the door control. "That's all I've got inside me any more, Garrus." She stripped her armour off as she strode across the common room, tripping a little when one shin guard stuck.

"Well, that's not good enough, Shepard," he called, chasing after her. "Not nearly. We need you. You're not allowed to just check out."

She stopped at the bedroom door, armour piled under both arms. "Why, Garrus? Why can't I just check out?"

"My daughter deserves better than a mother who turns to stone the moment she holds her. I deserve better than a mate who can stand lying in my arms for about thirty seconds before she sends herself into exile on the other side of the bed . . .. Who can't even make love any more." He strode over to her, popping the seals and lifting off his armour. "You told me to pull you back when you started to get lost, well, I'm weeks too late on that." He set his yoke and chest guard on the floor and reached up to strip the armour from his arm. "The second we walked into this _domin_, you checked out on us."

Shepard opened their bedroom door and stepped inside, dumping her armour inside and bent to wrestle her way out of her boots. Trapped, caged inside the outer trappings that held her prisoner in a life of constant battle, she began to feel a very real, very ugly panic building. "Is that what I am, Garrus? Am I lost? Checked out?" She tossed her boots over toward the closet. "Is that what this thick, black, evil poison running through my veins is called?"

He stripped off the rest of his armour, piling it behind one of the chairs, stopping when his undersuit hung around his waist to walk over to her. "Is that what you're feeling?"

Her hands flew out, spiked barricades to keep him at bay, and she spun, striding into their room, peeling off her underlayer. "I hold you, and I resent the safety I feel, because Lenka isn't safe." As the cold air hit her legs below her shorts and arms under her t-shirt sleeves, she felt naked . . . exposed . . . and held the underlayer between them like a shield.

"I hold Mercy to my breast," she continued, "and I wonder if anyone is holding Lenka, if she's getting enough to eat, if she's afraid." She swallowed hard, her eyes dropping to the floor. "If she remembers that we love her."

"And you don't think I feel any of that?" Garrus ripped the undersuit away and tossed it. He stepped toward her, but Shepard shoved him back and spun, ducking away from his hands.

When she stood between him and the door, she turned back. Despite whispering, she felt the barbs on every word as that black hole spat them out. "How do you do it, Garrus?"

Her mate felt them. She saw a wall slam up between them. "How do I do what, Shepard? Say it plainly."

She winced away from the venom lacing her own words, feeling it burn in the furrows the barbs left in her guts. "Get up every day, breathe, live, function like there isn't this huge piece missing?"

His eyes took on a bitter shine as he nodded, just the slightest movement, his mandibles dropping as she saw his breath hitch, his throat convulsing twice. "Is that what I've been doing?"

Solid and brutal as a spear driven into the earth, she lunged at him, her feet still rooted to the spot. "Why don't you hate me?" Her voice shot up, not quite shouting but only because she bit down on every word.

The glassiness spilled from the corner of one eye, and as he opened his mouth to speak a soft keen broke through on the leading edge of his words. "I think you've been doing enough of that on your own, don't you, Shepard?" He stepped toward her, but she thrust her hands out at him again. He stopped, his next words barely audible. "Do you hate me?"

She shook her head, but the black hole hissed at the lie, and her arms dropped. She tried to look into his eyes but couldn't face the unshed tears gathered there.

Again the small, sad nod. "Neither one of us did anything wrong when they took her. We fought like hell." He closed the distance between them slowly. "You're doing everything you can to get her back. Just because your overdeveloped sense of guilt keeps telling you otherwise . . .." He held a hand out to her. "It doesn't make it true, Shepard."

She just stared at his hand, part of her wanting to take it, to have him pull her into his arms and hold her, wanting it so badly that the ache just made the anger worse. She had no right. She didn't deserve any comfort. Her eyes locked on the blood staining his face. She promised to protect them, all of them.

_Bang up job, Shepard._

"You don't have to hate yourself for being happy with Mercy, for loving her - or me. It doesn't mean that you love or miss Lenka any less." He grabbed her hand. "You need to be here, with us."

She ripped her hand out of his, shouting before she even knew she intended to speak. "How, Garrus?" Shepard threw her pack across the room into the closet. Behind her Mercy began to scream, the sound of her terrified baby ripping a huge gash down her spine. "How am I supposed to be a proper mother to Mercy? Every minute I hold her, every moment I look into her eyes, I feel this happiness and love, and every minute of it feels like dying."

Storming over to the crib, she looked down inside and tried to smile. She closed her eyes and took deep breaths, trying to calm the beast raging inside her. Her baby needed her, and all she could find was the seething darkness.

"Don't you dare pick her up in that state," Garrus growled and called out the door. "Gira, please take Mercy somewhere she can't hear us."

The female eased past Shepard, cooing and making rumbling chirping noises, but even the turian subvocal music didn't ease the baby's crying.

Seeing the hysterical tears rolling down Mercy's cheeks, knowing that she caused them . . .. Shepard froze, her heart seizing, one massive convulsion of agony, as the tether holding her to her baby shuddered.

_You're going to destroy that beautiful girl all on your own, Shepard._

A soft mewl of horror and agony sawed its way through the barricade erected in her throat, and she bolted from the room, running through the common room and out the front door.


	4. Chapter 4

**Hyalus** - A particular type of spun glass used to make beautiful, abstract figures. It is always the natural blue/grey of the sand from which it is fired, but may contain threads or wires of metal (usually precious). Spinning hyalus figures is a singular art form, its secrets jealously guarded by its turian masters.

**Sorau dulca** - Sweet sister. A term of affection between females of any social tier, but particularly mother/daughter, sisters, aunt/niece, grandmother/granddaughter.

**Praela(s)** - The name for ancient warrior spirits who were believed to ride great beasts into war at the head of their tribe's legions. Spirits of great bravery, tenacity, and a fearsome beauty.

**Soluvermus** - A small (average size 8-12 cms/1-2 cms diameter), heavily armoured earthworm native to Palaven's more northern and southern regions.

**July 28, 2188**

"Shepard!"

She ignored Garrus's shout and ran blind, only managing to aim for smooth ground in front of her. A thunderstorm smashed around the inside of her head, lightning striking out of the black hole and searing along her spine to arc through her skull. Her stomach gave four hiccoughing warnings, and then her last meal forced its way up. Still running, she stumbled into the rubble off to the side and collapsed onto her knees. She heaved until nothing came up, then heaved some more. Only once knots of muscle spasms held her hunched over did she stop, wiping her mouth on the back of her hand.

"Shepard."

She turned toward the soft, relieved tones, watching Garrus ease down to a walk. Eyes darting to meet his, she shied away from the worry and empathy in his stare, and pushed herself to her feet. Turning away from the _domin_, she continued down the cleared path, her skinned knees stinging.

Garrus's long sigh rumbled after her. "Shepard, stop running."

Lashing out like a cornered wildcat, Shepard spun, a fierce hand pointing back toward the house. "Did you see Mercy's face, Garrus? My baby is terrified of me." She swooped down, picked up a rock and threw it as hard as she could into the field of rubble, not sure what to do with all the fear and pain. It felt like a billion insects crawling under the foreign, rotting cocoon of her skin.

He took a step toward her, his hands held out. "She's scared because we were fighting. She hasn't heard us argue." His talons darted for her shoulder, but she ducked away from them. "Spirits, I haven't heard us fight like that. It's scaring the hell out of me, right now."

She jerked her head at him, and he stopped. "I'm losing myself, Garrus. I'm turning into something . . .." Her brows knit together as she tried to force the truth out through her denial. The black hole stretched and yawned lightning that seared through her head. Clapping her hands to her temples, she squeezed her eyes shut and ground her teeth until the pain passed.

"You're not turning into anything, Shepard. You've always taken everything on yourself. When Ash died, Mordin, Thane . . . all of them." He hesitated, his mandibles dropping, his voice rolling with comforting subharmonics. "And you know they weren't the first or the worst. You carry the weight of every death all the way back to your family, and you beat yourself for never being fast or strong enough to save them all."

_"If I'd just obeyed Dad and stayed home."_ She closed her eyes and took a deep breath to banish the oldest of the 'if onlys'.

Garrus took a step closer but didn't move to touch her. His eyes, when she finally had the courage to meet them, didn't hold anger or even disappointment. All she saw on his face or heard in his voice when he spoke, was a combination of sorrow and love. "You've let me love you, and you've let me stand with you, but you've never let me share any of the burden."

Shepard glared at him - he should know better - and wandered a little further into the dark. "You've got your own worries, Garrus. Adding to them is too selfish." His subvocal manipulation calmed the storm in her head, leaving her wrung out and exhausted. She should be furious with him for pushing calm on her, but the relief felt too good to argue against. She flopped down onto a concrete block and stretched her feet out in front of her. Leaning down until her chest rested on her thighs, she let her arms hang limp at her sides, fingers trailing in the dirt.

"That's the part of all this you've never understood." He crouched a metre away. "Sharing the load is why people get married. It doesn't add to my problems or pain to help you with yours. It's the opposite. Taking care of you and Mercy helps me cope with Lenka's absence. You make it better not worse." A long sigh, the saddest she could remember hearing, escaped his throat, a soft keen underlying it. "Why do I make it worse for you, Shepard? Why does Mercy make it worse?"

Shepard jumped up and strode down the trail toward the valley. "I don't know how to explain this any better than I have, Garrus."

"I heard what you said." A short sharp grumble followed her, but she didn't hear footsteps. "You asked me how I get up in the morning, how I can love you and Mercy without it killing me?" He stopped, and she could hear him swallowing even across that distance.

His question halted her in her tracks. She turned to look at him, staring into his eyes for a moment before she nodded. "How?" The single word whispered out, a plea - almost a prayer - for help.

He took a step toward her, but that step felt like an answer to her prayer. "When we get Lenka back, she is going to need all of us at our best. She needs me to be the best father and the best mate I can be. If I allow us . . ." He gestured back and forth between them. ". . . to fall apart, what is she coming back to? If I allow myself to shut down or dig my way back down into the bottom of a bottle, which I've been more than tempted to do, how does that help her? When she comes back, she's not going to recognize her family."

He shrugged, a quick drop of his head, his hands flipping once. "I do wonder if Lenka is safe when I am holding the two of you. I don't sit down to a single meal without wondering if she's being fed well." A hand reached out a couple of centimetres, waited a moment, then fell back to his side. "But I still hold Mercy. I still eat. I'm doing it for Lenka, because we're going to get her back, Shepard." His long strides ate up half the distance between them.

In return, Shepard took a step toward him. "I'm scared, Garrus." She balled her fists together and punched them into her diaphragm, just below her breasts. She punched her fists into her belly again. "I've spent my whole life protecting people I didn't even know, and even though it's been hard scraping sometimes, I've always succeeded." Shaking her head, she pressed her fists in between the sharp blades of her ribs, her shoulders and back bowing in around them.

Garrus closed the gap another step.

"Fighting Saren, he came at me." Throwing her hands out to the sides, she paced to the edge of the rubble field. "Sovereign came at me. Harbinger . . . they all came at me, Garrus." She swooped down, snatched up another chunk of rubble, and threw it into the night. A fierce satisfaction straightened her shoulders. "They came at me, and I fought them. I took down every last fucking one of them. If I needed to force two sides of an argument together, I did it. If I needed to allow friends to sacrifice themselves, I did. If I needed to blow up a planet, I goddamned well did it. Whatever it took . . . I did it."

Throwing punches at the darkness, she thrashed, trying to beat something to death that she couldn't see, hear or smell. Maybe, somehow, if she could fight hard enough, the monster inside her - all the fear and rage - would manifest, and she could kill it once and for all. "You want me, you bastards, you come at me!" She screamed, a wordless shrill of rage and helplessness as her fists turned, slamming into her chest, turning on the terror that threatened to blow her apart. "You come at me! You leave my husband and my children out of it." The ground smacked into her knees peeling the skin from the heel of her hand before she realized that she'd collapsed. Her head dropped, limp, between her shoulders, her voice lowering to a whisper. "You leave the people I love out of it, and you come at me."

"Shepard." Garrus crouched and reached out, not close enough to touch her.

She scrambled up and turned on him, hands thrust out, holding him at bay. Holding empathy and pity and love at bay. Love eroded her, empathy rusted and pitted the steel she needed to make it through. Trusting love to keep her strong . . .. Balak showed her the folly of that. Love just gave them more targets.

"No, Garrus. I can't do it. I can't love this hard and set you and our babies up like targets. What was I thinking trying to have a family and a normal life?" Tears burned her eyes like acid. She swiped them away, but the burn remained, harsh and insistent. "I knew better. I fucking well knew better, but then I met you and fell in love. I wanted it so badly, and now I've put all of you in danger."

"Jane. Garrus."

Shepard looked up, frowning and running forward a couple of steps as Gira walked toward them. "Is Mercy okay?"

The _tarin_'s mandibles fluttered in a reassuring smile. "Yes, she's fine. Sol is playing with her, doing her physio." Stopping between them, she let out a long sigh. "Her parents, however, are not doing very well at all." She nodded over toward a large, mostly intact foundation. "Come and sit with me." When they didn't follow, she rumbled at them like unruly children. "Come. It wasn't a suggestion."

Shepard followed, keenly aware as she dragged her toes through the ash and dirt, that she looked the part of a petulant teen. When Gira sat in the corner of two walls, Shepard waited to see which side Garrus sat on and chose the other.

While Gira took obvious note of where they sat, she said nothing about it. She reached out and took their hands. "When Lazan died, Rossus and I were devastated, naturally. You believe you know the risks your children are taking when they go out into the galaxy, but nothing can prepare you for losing them. Lazan was so young, just off to the academy. Far too young to leave the _domin_ one morning never to return."

Gira squeezed Shepard's hand, forestalling the any words of sympathy. Staring down at the bare talons gripping her hand, Shepard suddenly saw everything that bound them together as females, wives, and mothers. It eased the storm, sending the darkness muttering back into the hole.

"Rossus showed the galaxy the face any proper turian father should show: stoic, resolute, proud of his son for showing such bravery and saving so many of his fellow cadets. I didn't show myself at all. At night, I would hear him keen, but I was too wrapped up in my own grief to comfort my beloved in his."

She swallowed and craned her neck a little as if working past something lodged in her throat. "That morning, Lazan and I argued. He wanted to move into the cadet housing. We lived so close that I couldn't see why he would." She chuckled softly. "Well, that's what I said. He was so bright . . . entered the academy nearly a cycle early. I just wasn't ready to let my youngest leave . . . wasn't ready to be alone in the _domin_." The _tarin_ shifted a little, stretching her back.

Shepard flipped her hand over to hold Gira's in hers.

A soft, musical sigh drifted on the warm, humid breeze. "Rossus slept in our eldest son's room because every time he came within ten metres of me, I screamed at him for not driving Lazan to the academy that morning and for leading both our sons into the military. Of course, he never encouraged them one way or the other. He believed they deserved to choose what path of service called to them, but he was a safe place to vent all the pain and anger." She pulled both of their hands closer to her, looking from one to the other.

"Our eldest son, Narlan, came home on leave almost a cycle later. He strode straight in the door, grabbed his father by the wrist, and dragged him shouting and struggling into our bedroom. I hadn't bothered to even get out of bed that day. I just lay there, staring out the window. When they came in the room, both of them broke down and embraced me. Narlan forced us to talk, told us that he still needed us, and we saw that we needed one another as well."

Gira turned to look at Shepard, her eyes sad and serious. "Life happens, Jane, and there is so little that we can do about most of it. All we can do is focus on what's in front of us, right now. If Lenka doesn't come home . . .."

Shepard shook her head and jumped up, mouth opening to protest, but Gira pulled her back down and silenced her with a talon over her lips.

"If she never comes back to you, will you sacrifice the rest of your family, or will you give them everything you would have given her? She might never come home." She released Garrus and reached up to caress Shepard's cheek. "I know no one wants to say that, and I hope it's not the case, but it's a possibility." She tilted her head behind her toward Garrus without taking her gaze from Shepard's. "You have so much else to live for. Don't spend your time obsessing over what you don't have, Jane. You will miss out on so much life, so much joy. You're doing what you can to find your daughter. Now do what you can to give her a solid home and a sane, healthy mother to come home to."

She pulled Shepard toward her, her brow warm and smooth against Shepard's, her talons light on the admiral's shoulders. Shepard closed her eyes, feeling an energy moving between them, almost as if they formed two parts of the same person . . . two halves that had never come in contact before, but having connected, settled into place.

Gira's voice remained soft, her tone and subvocals reaching down inside Shepard to lance a wound so old, she didn't even realize that the pain wasn't a normal part of her. "You could lose all of them at any time. Not just because of terrorists, but a thousand other things." She pulled back and turned, reaching out to Garrus, pulling him over to crouch at her side. "Your father showed me vid of your bonding. I've never seen two people who love one another more than the two of you." Her brow plates dropped and she chuffed, low and exasperated. "But you're idiots. Always dancing around one another, trying not to say or do anything to make a mess."

She shrugged, her hand tightening around Shepard's almost painfully. "Life is mess. It's arguing over drinking _puala_ nectar out of the container and whose turn it is to clean the bathroom. It's making up, and making love, and having children, filling your lives with the chaos and laughter of them." She touched brows with Shepard again, the admiral leaning into the touch that time, hungry for it as the other female's presence drained that old wound.

As if she could feel how badly Shepard needed a mother's touch, Gira released her hand and wrapped an arm around her shoulders, holding her close. "And yes, sometimes it's losing them, and it breaks your soul into pieces, but if you're as lucky as the two of you, there's someone there to help you put it back together." The _tarin_'s eyes returned to stare into Shepard's. "Then your heart will break again and again. The whole messy business is your life, not just the bad parts and not just the good parts." She pulled back and caressed Shepard's cheek with her thumb. "Beautiful girl, I'm not trying to diminish your pain; I've felt it. But right now, you're letting so much good fly right by you. You're never going to get this time back with Mercy."

Looking over at Garrus, she chuffed again and released his hand to cuff the back of his head. "And you're letting her, because you treat her like this fragile _hyalus_ instead of the_ praela_ you know she is." She stood, pulling them up behind her. "Come with me."

Shepard dragged a little, unsure what Gira intended to do with them. The voice of denial roared inside her. She couldn't do what the _tarin_ said, and just live happily until Lenka came home. How was she supposed to do that? The black hole kicked up again, thunder and lightning roaring through her until she could barely see where she walked.

On the cleared trail, Gira released them. Turning to Shepard, she held out a hand. "Off with the shirt."

Shepard arched a brow and pulled back, crossing her arms. "No. What?" She glanced around. No. She was the Vice-Commandant of the academy, Garrus was going to be confirmed in just over a week . . . she couldn't just strip down in the middle of their neighbourhood.

Gira shook the hand at her a little. "Off with the shirt. Just do what you're told before I have to slap you in the head."

"Gira . . .." Garrus stepped between them a little. "Humans . . .."

Shepard shifted behind him a little, offering up fervent prayers that if she could hide, Gira might forget about her crazy plan.

"Yes, human females have mammaries." Gira looked around. "I don't see any human males around to be overcome by lust at the sight, nor do I expect her to be taken down by a pack of starving, feral human infants." She jabbed her hand toward Shepard with an emphasis that belied the humour in her words. "I really am very serious."

Shepard looked around again then shrugged out of her t-shirt and handed it over. She crossed her arms over herself, moving even further behind Garrus. This would be the time that some errant news crew would happen by to get aerial footage of the deviant human bond-mate of the newest hierarch.

Gira gestured to Garrus. "Come on, give your mate cover, because I want the lacy harness thing too." She draped the shirt over her arm and held out her hand. Sighing, the elder _tarin_ deflated a little as they resisted. "Trust me, please? I haven't lost my mind. I have a purpose."

Shepard looked up, tensing as Garrus moved in close, sheltering her against the right side of his body. Heart hammering in her chest, she took refuge against his side and she reached behind her to undo her bra, sliding it off. She passed it over then hunched in, crossing her arms over her chest, eyes moving without rest to be sure that the ruins weren't suddenly filled with curious onlookers with cameras.

Her eyes slid over to Gira every few seconds as she waited to see just what it was the _tarin_ had planned, but then they came to rest on the steel grey, almost iridescent sheen of the plates angled across Garrus's chest. He stood tall, his shoulders back, making himself as large as he could as if worried that some lust-mad human male or pack of feral infants just might come along. Her fingertip touched a scar in the long plate that ran from under his arm to his keel. The years had left their share of wear and tear, just as they had upon her body, but as she looked up at him, she was struck by how beautiful her husband was. How had she stopped seeing that?

She moved a little closer into his heat envelope. When she'd first seen him, she'd thought his carapace would feel cool. The heat he threw off surprised her. Now her fingers ached to skate along those smooth lines, to let him draw her into the comfort of that warmth. His arms . . .. She swallowed a lump of what felt like pine cones. His arms always felt like a fortress capable of keeping the entire galaxy at bay.

"Better."

Shepard jumped a little at Gira's voice as it broke her intent focus on Garrus. The _tarin_ backed up and sat on a chunk of wall, her back turned to them. "Now, I want you to dance the last two movements of the Cohamentum."

They both spun to face her, both forgetting Shepard's state of near undress. Shepard's arms fell to hang numb at her sides, her eyebrows dropping. What sort of sick sadism would prompt Gira to do this to them? Fury smoldered through her, rising like bubbles in simmering water that prickled and burned from her fingers to her shoulders. How could Gira do that to Garrus? How could she think that reminding him of everything life had stolen from him since that day amounted to anything less than torture?

_Everything you've stolen from him since that day._

Shepard strode over and held out her hand, back and shoulders stiff, struggling to contain the panic and anger. "No. Give me back my clothing, please, Gira."

Eyes like burnished copper stared straight into her, comforting as they shone with the warmth of the setting sun. It slipped along under her skin, easing the boiling anger. _"Time to stop. Time to remember,"_ it whispered.

"You lost something the moment you entered my _domin_." A gentle smile eased the anger a little more. "What was it?"

Shepard backed up a step and shook her head, the movement reminding her of her state of undress, and she clapped her arms back across her chest. "Nothing."

Garrus stepped up, sheltering her. "Shepard, you know that's not true." He held out his hand. "Please, we don't have to do the movements, but let me hold you."

She backed away. "Why can't you all just let me deal with this?" The words squeezed out, shrill and flat. "We'll get her back and everything will be all right."

Movement up the road sent Shepard ducking in behind Garrus, easing out a little once she saw it was Sol and Mercy. "Is she okay?"

"She's fine, just hungry, so I brought her and the blanket thing to you when you didn't come to her." Sol stopped and stared at Shepard for a moment, her eyes so intense that Shepard reflexively hid behind Garrus. After thirty seconds or so, Sol turned to Gira. "Here, this little melon can hang out with her_ ama_ for a minute." She eased Mercy out of the carrier's folds and into the elder turian's arms.

Once she untied the wrap, Sol turned back to Shepard, stepping around Garrus. "Look at you," Sol said, her voice soft, rumbling with a low keen from her second larynx. "Dear spirits, Jane." She took Shepard's wrists in her talons and pulled her arms away from her torso. "You're nothing but bones." Her ice-blue eyes faded to grey in the dark as they glassed over, and her mandibles pulled in tight against her face. "Is Garrus going to have to find Lenka and raise these girls all by himself?"

Shepard shook her head and pulled her arms free, wrapping them around herself. "I'm fine." She stepped closer into Garrus, but he turned leaving her unsheltered as Sol stepped in.

"Bullshit, you're fine. How much weight have you lost? Fifteen kilos?" Sol's words came out sharp-edged, her entire manner snapping from sad to terrifyingly furious. A lightning quick hand slapped Shepard in the back of the head, hard enough to make her ears ring. "If I had known that all this stupidity and selfishness was hiding under the woman I met, I would have told my brother to run his ass off until he was well clear of you"

Sol chuffed in disgust. "You've decided to turn in on yourself, consume yourself in anger and self-pity and just die." She slapped Shepard again. "Well, if you're going to kill yourself, give me the leggings and wander off into the rubble to damn well do it. Let my brother mourn and move on, because I won't allow you to make him watch you commit suicide slowly."

Shepard's legs trembled, threatening to dump her in a heap to moulder along with the rest of the ruins. Her mind spun, searching for an answer to Sol's accusations, but just ended up looping in useless, incoherent panic. Wrapping her arms around herself, she backed away from them, looking from one to the next, eyes never staying fixed on one of them for more than a second. "Sol, I . . .." Stumbling backwards a couple of steps, she clenched her jaw against the traitorous tears and shook her head.

"Is that it? You're going?" Sol cocked her hip and crossed her arms. When Garrus moved, she grabbed his arm and held him back. She shrugged. "You're moving away from us, not toward us, so . . .."

Shepard stopped, her eyes looking to Mercy, latching onto her. Her face caved into an agonized grimace. Opening her mouth to speak, she took a halting step forward.

"No." Sol stepped in front of the baby, blocking Shepard's view. The movement stole the air from the space where Shepard stood, leaving her sucking vacuum. Her hands shot up to ball at her throat, nails digging into the skin as she tried to draw breath against the crushing absence. Her joints strained against the bones, her lungs burned and hitched endlessly as they tried to take a breath but failed. Spaced again. Suffocating and decompressing again.

_Just let go, damn it. Just let it all go._

"This baby needs a mother, not the frigid teats and stiff arms of a corpse that hasn't wised up enough to lie down." Sol nodded toward the wasteland of downtown. "Go on, if you're going. I'm sure you can find a great many pistols out there willing to take care of that troublesome breathing-heartbeat issue for you."

"No." Shepard took another halting step, her whole body shaking.

Sol barked a cold and bitter laugh. "No, what?"

Shepard lifted her head and let out a quick huff of breath, her back straightening a little. "No. I'm not going anywhere." The black hole belched up fury, forcing her ramrod straight. "This is my husband and child."

Sol shrugged. "I don't know that you have a choice in it. I don't see anything in front of me that I want near my family."

Shepard drew herself up, the fury demanding that she strike back, throw Sol to the ground and kick the crap out of her. How dare the turian make demands of her, tell her to leave her family?

Sol laughed, ice cracking along a river. "You going to fight me? Well, come on then. Right now the baby could lay you out, and you think you're going to take down one of the top-ranked hand to hand specialists in the turian military?" Taking a couple of steps forward, she held out her hands. "Well?"

Shepard looked to Garrus who stood slightly behind Sol's left shoulder, his stare meeting and holding hers, but he looked as gob-smacked and lost as she felt. He shifted, one foot scraping forward a couple of centimetres, but his sister put her arm out to stop him.

"Don't look to him. He'd hold you until the moment you disappeared. He loves you enough to put himself through that. I love him too much to allow it." Sol nodded toward Mercy who giggled and grabbed for Gira's mandibles as the _tarin_ made faces. "And don't even think about testing me over that _puala_ fruit. I'll kill you myself before I let you put her through that."

"Sol . . .." Shepard felt the anger flash into a plume of flame and smoke, then vanish. She raked her hands through her hair and spun away from her family, pacing fast and frantic a couple steps one way, then the other. What? What was she supposed to do? She stopped, her arms falling to dangle loose from her shoulders. The trembling eased, but the helplessness hung on. What did she do? What could she do?

"What?" Her sister took a stride toward her. "What, Jane?"

Shepard's hands flipped helplessly at her sides.

"Say it, come on! Just fucking say it, Jane." Sol's laugh smashed the ice, letting the river loose, but it rolled over Shepard like a wave of acid sludge. "You've never said it before?" Leaning forward, she tilted her head. "You're the answer woman, the fixer. Every situation is something you can repair. If you don't see how to win right away, you'll beat the problem to death until it gives up its solution, right?" A knowing nod chased a derisive chuff from the _tarin_'s throat. "If you try to beat this into submission, you're going to kill yourself."

Shepard took a long, slow breath, her face relaxing into a frown as she turned to look into her sister's eyes again.

Sol nodded, her whole demeanour softening. "So say it. What's going to happen if you just admit it? Is the galaxy going to come to an end?"

The air felt moist and warm, almost filling in an oddly satisfying way as Shepard drew in a long breath. "I don't know what to do." As the words drifted out, she wasn't sure she'd spoken them, so tried them on again. "I don't know what to do, Sol."

The _tarin_ smiled, a wide flutter of her mandibles, and nodded. "That's because there's nothing you can do, _sorau dulca_. For all the planning, actions, task forces, and maneuvering, at the end of the day, there is nothing you can do to force the universe to give Lenka back." She took a step forward. "It's okay to not know what to do, sometimes. It's even okay to be unable to do anything or to stop something from happening."

Shepard turned back to look at Garrus. He nodded a little and held out his hand. She took another of the deep breaths that felt as though they filled her whole body with air and warmth. It poured into the hole, and for a moment, the darkness stopped pulling her down. She took advantage of the second of clarity, her heart and mind dropping their shackles, and just breathed.

"I don't know how to get our girl back, Garrus," she said, the words flat and worn, all the barbs and edges stripped.

He nodded. "I know." A tiny shrug lowered his head in his cowl. "I don't either. I wish I did."

She took a step toward him, filling herself with another slow, deep breath. "But I don't know how to live without her."

He just nodded, his hand still held out. "We'll keep searching until we find her."

"I can't fix this." The realization settled gently into the space between them. She waited for the crushing pain to follow it, but the words just hung there. Her body felt oddly hollow. "I can't fix this."

"What happened when you came into my _domin_, Jane?" Gira asked, her voice soft and toned to soothe Mercy. She stood and cradled the baby against her shoulder, bouncing a little.

Taking another step forward, Shepard looked into Garrus's eyes, realizing belatedly and with surprise that he wasn't wearing his visor. Her mouth opened and the words spilled out as if wondering why she hadn't just set them free a month before. "On the _Normandy_, I always felt her right beside me. I could lie in bed, close my eyes, and hear her whispering to Jane instead of going to sleep." Tears filled her head and clouded her vision. She sniffed and blinked them back, pressing her lips together. An ache flowed from the hole in the center of her chest, slowly spreading out along her ribs and down her spine. She swallowed hard and cleared her throat. "I could sit at my desk, lean back, and hear her reading to herself down on the bed, or splashing water around in the shower."

She bit down on the inside of her bottom lip, her body convulsing in slow waves of grief, then sucked in a long, wet breath. Sniffing, she swiped at her cheeks and nose as the tears spilled free. "It was like she was always just in the other room, and would be right back." She glanced up to meet Garrus's eyes for a moment, but then looked away, ashamed, as she whispered, "I'd ask to make love, because I prayed that afterward, Kaidan or Dad would just bring her back, like every other time." Her hand rose, trembled like a leaf sighing on the wind for a moment, then fell. "I'm so sorry, Garrus."

Backing up a couple of steps, she clenched her arms over her chest again and looked up into the black sky. Quiet sobs dragged her along the rocky bottom of her grief, but then she surfaced with another thick, sticky sniff and wiped her face with both hands. She looked into her husband's eyes, praying not to see reproach there. "But god, when we walked in the door here, she was just gone." She reached out, only love and sorrow looking back at her. "Our Lenka was just gone, Garrus."

He nodded and strode forward, taking her hand and pulling her in against him. "I know, Shepard." He leaned down and nuzzled her brow. "I know."

Shepard wrapped her arms around him and pressed along his length. Closing her eyes she focused on the solid, familiar heat of him against her skin, the scent of him. He bent down far enough for her to tuck her head in under his jaw.

"Now, the last movements of the Cohamentum," Gira said, her whisper feeding rather than disturbing the calm that settled over them.

Garrus pulled back a little, staring into her eyes as he reached behind him for her hands. She stared right back, her palms pressed to his. He eased away from her, his right foot drawing back. As if she'd done it the day before, Shepard followed him, rising onto her toes, trusting him to hold her as he drew her forward, her body angled and resting almost entirely on their joined hands.

She breathed slow, clean breaths, pouring them down into the hole, the storm clouds there settling, albeit loathfully. Garrus stepped into her and past in two fluid strides, twirling her so that their arms embraced in front of her. She hopped, and he lifted and spun them both. His strength flowed down his arms and into hers, steadying their trembling. He held her through an extra turn, then spun her back, their eyes locking once more as he pulled her in against him. Her skin brushed against his, tingling and heated with the contact, and she knew why Gira had taken her shirt. For first time in nearly seven months, Shepard felt her husband's body alive and present. Since Lenka's abduction, she'd used him, and she'd given in to his needs, but she hadn't made love to her husband in more than seven months.

Through the movements, the way he held her, even the emotions playing out in his eyes, he opened himself to her. His patience, his compassion, his strength and unflinching loyalty - the beauty of him that she'd forgotten to see - washed over her like warm summer rain. Tears flowed again, but softly, with the gentleness of shared mourning, of grief met with understanding and love. His love. He radiated it, caressing her from head to foot as it pulled her in, asking her to open the gates and let him into the fortress of rage and mourning she'd erected around herself.

_You don't deserve him. You've never deserved him._

The black hole fought back, but she breathed into it, keeping it under a tremulous control. She needed to be the mother Lenka remembered. She needed to do a whole lot better by Mercy and Garrus. Getting angry and hard, erecting walls that cut her off from everyone . . . it played right into Balak's hands. It played right into the enemy's hands, regardless of what they called themselves. The people around her were the only reason she defeated Saren, the Collectors, and the Reapers. Without them, she would have stumbled far more than she did. Without Garrus catching her each time, she would have fallen and never gotten back up.

She wrapped around him as the water sank into the earth, feeding the mother of all life. She heard Mercy laugh, and a smile broke across her face. Just before the wedding, she'd looked into the mirror and watched Jane Shepard: Garrus Vakarian's wife, Mercy and Lenka's mother painted over Commander Shepard. That woman in the mirror held so much hope, so much joy in her new role, her family. How had she allowed that felicity to turn to ash? Why had she fallen back into Commander Shepard's threadbare, expired shell like a butterfly crawling back into its chrysalis?

Allowing the new, warm, loving woman from the mirror to assert herself once more, Shepard pressed herself against Garrus, the steps smoothing and beginning to flow with that quicksilver fluidity they'd left behind only two days after finding it. A hollow wind drifted across the spaces where she'd etched so many beautiful vows. Surely promises made from a place that deep couldn't just be wiped away by circumstance.

Shepard pulled back a little without missing a step, weaving a gentle caress down his mandible into the movements. He'd kept every single one of his vows, despite losing Lenka, despite his PTSD getting worse every day. She brushed a kiss against his mouth as she twirled, coming back around to be lifted and cradled in his arms. Pressing her brow to his, she wrapped her arms around his neck.

"I promise to share in your joys and your sorrows, care for you when you are ill, uplift you when you are down, and support you in all things," she whispered, her tone musical and too low to carry beyond his hearing. "I promise to be your safe harbour; the one, true thing upon which you can always depend . . .." She kept her arms tight around his neck as he lowered her feet to the ground. ". . . the person who speaks truth when it seems as though lies are all you can hear; the arms that will always hold you when you need to be reminded that you are cherished; the mother of your children; and your most faithful companion."

She stared into his eyes, the black hole muttering to itself but still gripped tight. "I can't promise to remember them every moment, Garrus, but I'm sorry that I've failed in keeping those promises so completely since I made them." She reached up and caressed his scars. "I always assume you'll be there when I fight my way out of the craziness."

"I always will be, Shepard." His voice reached down inside and blocked that hollow wind, allowing the dust to clear enough for her to see the promises she'd made still etched clear and bold.

"And then I tell you to trust me to be there for you and promptly disappear into the crazy again. I've got to stop. Somehow, I have to stop saying I'm going to do better and actually do better." Standing on her toes, she rested her brow gently against his chin. "Thank you for being so patient with me."

He nuzzled her. "We've been through death and back, Shepard. We need to quit thinking our bond is so fragile that it can't withstand our being honest with one another." He laughed soft and frustrated. "Damn, we've said we're going to be honest with one another more than once too, but never do it, haven't we? But, you know, Mrs. Vakarian, we keep making it through all the madness and crisis intact, so I feel fairly sure our bond can handle the same problems before they grow from _soluvermus_ into thresher maws."

Sol walked up, wrapping an arm around them both. "Start, please, because if you two ever force me to be that mean again, I'll shoot you both. Kaidan and I will raise your kids. Understood?"

Shepard slipped an arm out from between her husband and her sister and reached up, pressing it against the back of Sol's long, graceful neck. "Thank you, _sorau dulca_. I love you."

Sol pressed her brow to Shepard's. "And I, you." She touched brows with her brother, then released them. She threaded Mercy's wrap between Shepard and Garrus, tying it around Shepard's waist. After hugging them both again, she headed back up to the _domin_, stopping a few metres up to wait for Gira.

Gira helped Shepard nestle Mercy into the folds of the wrap.

"Thank you, Gira." She leaned over and kissed the _tarin_'s cheek.

The female nodded and reached up to press her talons to Shepard's cheek, then Garrus's and followed Sol.

Mercy giggled and cooed, singing away in her own private language as she smiled up at Shepard.

"Hey, beautiful." She cradled her daughter in her arms and lifted her to press kisses to her brow, nose and cheeks. "I love you so much, and I'm sorry I scared you. I promise, Mommy will never do that again." She settled Mercy to nurse then looked up at Garrus.

After a second, he nodded and pulled them both close, resting his brow against the top of Shepard's head. "We'll be okay, Shepard. Just don't give up on us."

She turned a little in his arms so she could rest one side against his length. "We need a safe word, Garrus. When we notice the other one slipping, we can offer a little reminder that we want things to be different."

His mandibles fluttered. "I know just the words."

She smiled and nodded as he spoke, knowing exactly what words he intended to use. The black hole moaned and rolled, but she closed her eyes and leaned into her husband, savouring the warmth of him against her skin and her daughter held close and safe to her breast. The missing piece of her heart needed to return to a sane, functional, loving family. Garrus was oh so right about that.

"I love you, Shepard," he whispered into her hair.

"And I love you, Garrus. Always."


	5. Chapter 5

**July 28, 2188**

Stepping through the door, Shepard felt Gira's _domin_ wrap comforting arms around her, drawing her into its warmth. Closing her eyes for a moment, she listened to the low, rich voices talking in the _caman_. Over the month, her comprehension of the closed dialect had become proficient enough to glean that the topic of their discussion was Garrus's confirmation in a few days and his security up until that all-important vote. A topic of some serious concern considering what happened earlier. She needed to talk to Barl and Herros. Hell, she'd follow her husband everywhere herself if necessary.

She inhaled a deep breath of roasting meat. Her stomach growled, not caring that the meat would probably kill her. Another deep breath and she shook her head as her nose identified meatloaf. Gira went out of her way to make Shepard feel at home, even having taken levo cooking lessons in order to make her favorites. Before they moved out on their own, Shepard knew she needed to learn how to cook for Garrus. Bare minimum she could avoiding kill her husband, but maybe she could also learn to make him food that didn't taste like it came from the waste bin.

"Shepard?" Garrus stepped around her, his hand pressing into the small of her back. "Everything okay?"

A weary, watercolour smile painted itself across her face as she looked into his eyes and nodded. "I'm fine." She looked around her. "I hope our house feels like this."

He guided her into the common room, heading toward the bedroom. "It'll be even better, because it'll be ours."

"The evening meal will be ready in half an hour," Gira called from her seat at the table. The three turians nursed steaming cups of _amarceru_.

"It smells amazing," Shepard said as she scooted past into the room.

As she entered the cool, comfortable bedroom, she knew what Garrus meant when he said their home would be even more comforting. Even just that bedroom, their temporary home, smelled of them. The herbs they used in their cleansers, Mercy's fresh baby scent, just . . . them, and it made a difference. All it lacked were the cheery giggles of a small batarian.

_Our home._

Those words settled deep and true. _Ours_. That's what it came down to. She untangled Mercy from her wrap and laid her down in the middle of the large bed, then untied and unwound the fabric. Stripping off her shorts, she swapped them for a soft robe of cream _tussat_ fiber, one of her wedding gifts. She ran her fingers over the thick, heavy weave, marvelling at its softness. Why hadn't she worn it before?

_Punishing myself, of course. How much would dad hate me doing that?_

Sitting on the side of the bed, Shepard leaned over to rub Mercy's belly. "Your grandpa would have loved to meet you. He had hands bigger than you, but they were so gentle. His laugh boomed like a thunderstorm, but the kind you curl up to listen to, cozy and comfortable in a blanket by the fire."

Garrus walked in the door and headed to the closet, putting his armour away far more neatly than Shepard had. Hers spilled out the door and halfway across the room. Garrus bent to pick it up.

"That's okay, Garrus. I can put it away."

He shook his head and nodded toward Mercy. "I've got it. What were my ladies talking about?"

"I was just telling the biscuit about her grandfather." She let out a long, exhausted breath and closed her eyes. "I could sleep forever."

He finished stacking her armour. "Why don't we save time and have a group shower, eat and then collapse?" He walked over and ran his talons through Shepard's hair. "You've had a tough day, and my head hurts."

Shepard stood and reached up to check out his wound, doing her best to block out how close the bullet had come to stealing her husband. "Bend down so I can see it." When he did as she asked, she prodded and poked a bit. "Not feeling nauseated at all, are you?"

"No." He reached up and took her hands in his. "There's no concussion, just a big, sore-as-hell furrow in my fringe. Nothing a little medigel and a couple of days won't fix." He tugged on her hands. "Come on, grab Mercy, and we'll pile in the shower."

Instead, Shepard slipped her arms around him. The black hole rumbled and groaned, but she breathed into it and concentrated on the feeling of her husband pressed up against her. "I've missed you," she whispered, realizing the truth as she said it. Spending every night alone on the last half metre of bed, her back turned to where she wanted to be, had been penance. "I almost lost you tonight," she whispered, "and I'd wasted the last month."

Garrus leaned down and nuzzled her temple. When he spoke, she could hear the smile in his words. "I've always got your back, Shepard. Always."

She pulled back and reached up to caress the side of his face. "I know, and from here on on out, I'm going to do a whole lot better at having yours." Standing on her toes, she leaned up to kiss him. "Okay, getting clean in time for supper." She turned to lift Mercy off the bed. "You definitely need a shower baby girl. It's all those long hours of being cute, I understand. It's so hard to stay baby fresh when working that hard."

A half hour later, the family sat down to the evening meal, Mercy doing her best to wear more than she ate while Garrus patiently scooped it all back up and tried again. Shepard watched them, almost able to feel Lenka sitting on her lap, giggling over the mess Mercy made. Her hands ached to stroke that narrow little back, still too skinny even after months of eating everything in sight. She closed her eyes, the child' smell filling her nostrils; a cold, hollow sliver of loss burrowing into her heart as thin arms wrapped tight around her neck, so strong and so full of love.

A warm, very present hand rubbed between her shoulder blades, and she opened her eyes, turning to give her husband a thin-lipped smile and a nod. She was okay. Sad almost to the point of suffocation, but okay. Strange how she'd never thought those two things could exist in the same place at the same time. Her whole adult life she'd been a person of absolutes. Absolutely sad or absolutely happy. Fearless or paralyzed with terror. Block one out to feel the other. Too bad life didn't work that way.

She reached out and caressed Garrus's fringe, her smile losing a little of the tightness as he pressed into her hand.

"Will you be able to join me to look at the house tomorrow?" Gira asked, her mandibles giving away her excitement as they fluttered. Her talons straightened her cutlery, lining everything up as precisely as possible, one of the elder female's tells that she was worried or stressed.

Shepard nodded, letting her hand slide down to rest just inside the cowl of Garrus's robe. "Sure. I just have a bunch of paperwork type stuff to do to get the foundation set up."

Garrus cleared his throat. "Actually, I was hoping you and Mercy could come with me tomorrow."

Turning to look into his eyes, Shepard let out a soft breath. "Okay." She shook her head. "Well, I don't want to go look at it without you anyway, so . . ." She looked back to Gira. "Could we go up just before dinner? It should still be light."

The _tarin_ nodded. "That will be fine. It's going to be beautiful. I'm so excited for you both to see it."

Shepard reached out to squeeze Gira's talons. "I know it will be. Thank you so much for all the work you've done getting it ready for us." She leaned over next to the _tarin_'s aural canal. "But I think you and Dad need to say a few things before a certain son wonders where his father is going to live." She chuckled and nodded to the perfectly aligned and centered articles in front of the female. "At least, if I'm reading your cutlery properly."

Gira nodded, her mandibles fluttering a little. "How long have you known?"

"A few months." Shepard shrugged. "And Garrus knows, he just hasn't realized he does."

"What are you two whispering about over there?" Sol asked, narrowing one eye.

Shepard sighed and sat up, her hand moving from Garrus's cowl to rub Mercy's back as Garrus lifted the baby to cuddle against his chest. "New beginnings," she said, smiling at her sister.

"Speaking of," Garrus said. "You, Kaidan, _Pari_, and Gira are coming to the reception after the swearing in?"

"Well, I don't know," Sol grumbled, making a show out of considering his question. Her talons drummed on the table a little. "It's on a weekend, and Kaidan and I don't get to see one another as much since he started obsessing over the academy." Her head bobbed in a shrug. "Besides, it's going to be boring."

Shepard cocked an eyebrow and shook her head. "You're so bad. Just put him out of his misery."

Sol grinned and let out a huge half raspberry, half sigh. "Oh fine, I'll go to your stupid, boring party, but I won't dance." She shook her head and crossed her arms, her chin jutting out defiantly. "You can't make me dance."

"No, but Kaidan will." Shepard laid her hand over Garrus's, squeezing his talons. "I swear, it's the saddest thing I've ever seen. One glance from those big brown eyes of his and tough ol' Sol Vakarian turns to giggling mush."

Sol glared across the table. "Be glad I can't kick you from over here. I do not turn to mush." She cleared her throat and squared her shoulders. "Nor do I giggle." Cutting her stare across the table to her father, Sol raised a brow plate. "But, if I did, and I'm not saying I do, I wouldn't be the only one, would I, _Pari_?"

Herros held up his hands. "Leave me out of this."

Shepard pinned him with a thoughtful stare. "Now Sol mentions it . . ."

Gira laughed, soft and musical. "You two are as subtle as a drunken Yahg."

"I'm lost, as usual," Garrus sighed.

"Probably not as lost as you think." Shepard squeezed his talons. "We're just applying a lot of really not-so-subtle pressure on your _pari_."

Herros let his head hang for a second, his shoulders heaving in an exaggerated sigh. "Very well." He held his hand out to Gira, his mandibles fluttering. "As you know, Rossus and I swore _karifratrus_ when we were young soldiers."

Garrus nodded, looking to Shepard, still confused. She caressed the back of his hand with her thumb and nodded toward his father.

"Your _mari_ has been gone for two cycles now, and since Rossus passed, Gira and I have been . . .."

"Spirits, males make this painful," Sol groaned. "Garrus, _Pari_ and Gira are together. He'll be living here even once the rest of us move out." She met her father's glare and shrugged. "What? We would have still been here next week waiting for you to get it out."

Herros closed his talons around Gira's as the female placed her hand in his. "Sol is as correct as she is blunt."

Garrus nodded. "Oh, well, excellent. I thought you were going to hit us with bad news or something." Looking over at Sol, he shook his head a little. "You could have let _Pari_ tell us. It was his chance to stand in our boots and explain that he was going to be living with a female. You robbed us of a chance to make him squirm that we'll never get back."

"Garrus," Shepard scolded. "I think it's brilliant. No two people deserve more happiness."

Sol groaned. "I didn't think of that." Her eyes narrowed into a glare. "Why didn't you stop me, Twig? Remember when he came home to chase off my academy graduation date?" She pinned her father with a sharp stare. "Every gun he owned laid out on the table in the common room. I had to take my older brother to my graduation party." As she said the last, she lifted a brow plate, challenging Herros.

"You have yet to thank me for that," he replied, clearing his throat. "That young _torin_ was twitchy and strange. Very high strung."

"Every gun you owned," she protested. "The great heroes of old would have been twitchy escorting the daughter of a male with such an obvious firearms fixation." After a moment, her arms unfolded and she chuckled. "He was a little strange though. I asked him to be my date mostly because I knew it would make you crazy, and you'd come home to deal with me."

Shepard watched her sister, a shudder of pain and sadness passing through her. Despite the tough face she showed to the galaxy, Sol had been just as hurt by her father's absence as Garrus. At least Herros realized his mistakes in time to know his children as adults.

"All Sol's indiscretion aside," Garrus said, "I'm happy for you both. It's what we fought for, all of us on our different fronts . . . this chance to be with people we love. Life's too short to spend it alone." Slipping his hand out from under Shepard's, he reached across in front of her to take Gira's hand. "I know he'll be very happy, but if he doesn't hold up his end, you just let us know. We'll set him straight."

Herros's warm laugh eased Shepard down into her chair, breaking down her control over her exhaustion. Her muscles ached with it as if she were coming down with the flu. She grumbled under her breath. She'd better not be.

Garrus pulled back, running his hand over Shepard's hair. "On this happy note, I'm going to take my ladies to bed," Garrus said, settling Mercy in her recliner.

Shepard nodded. "I'm tired, and we do have to be up early." She leaned over to hug Gira. "I'm so glad for you and _Pari_. I love you."

"I love you too, beautiful girl." Gira leaned close to Shepard's ear. "I set out some oil to steep earlier. Take a few minutes to reconnect before you go to sleep."

"Thank you." She touched her brow to the _tarin_'s then stood. "Goodnight _Pari_. Goodnight Sol. Love you both." She headed into the bathroom to brush her teeth. Part way through, her legs began to feel weak, her thigh muscles trembling. She sat on the toilet to finish. "You've got to start eating, Shepard," she whispered. The weakness passed, so she washed her face and headed into their bedroom.

"There's your _mari_," Garrus called a few moments later when she walked into their bedroom. He looked up from where he was changing Mercy into her pyjamas. "Just in time for late night snack and story time."

"My favorite time of the whole day," Shepard said. She climbed across the bed, piled her pillows up against the headboard and settled in, holding out her arms.

_My favorite time of the whole day._

The fact it was true made up a huge part of why it hurt so badly. With the three of them cuddled together on the bed, the empty space where Lenka should be yawned all the wider. One she got Mercy settled, she beckoned to Garrus. "Come on, get your butt up here, Vakarian."

While Mercy nursed, Garrus told them a story about one of the ancient turian heroes, Trillan Fralonis, who ended two hundred cycles of war between his father's city and the neighboring one by redirecting the yearly mating migration of the _maraquil_ from the cliff heights to the neighboring city. Thousands of screeching, pooping, aggressive raptors roosting in every nook and cranny, quickly drove the people from their city.

"That's so gross," Shepard sighed. "Brilliant, but gross."

Garrus nodded and nuzzled her neck. "Trillan's father accepted their surrender and made them a camp to live in until the _maraquil_ headed back to the sea."

Shepard turned to kissed his brow. "Got to love a _torin_ who uses the space inside his skull for more than holding his fringe up." Mercy had fallen asleep tucked in against Shepard's breast, so she eased herself off the bed to tuck the baby into her crib. "Sleep sweet, precious girl," she whispered, kissing Mercy's brow.

Turning from the crib, Shepard nodded to her husband. "Off with the robe, big guy." Fetching the flask of oil Gira had left on one of the small tables, she moved back to the bed.

"Shepard, you don't have to . . .." He met her eyes, his shining with understanding. "I know you're tired."

A soft smile tugged at one corner of her mouth as she tilted her chin toward him. "Off with it, husband. I've been too tired for too long as it is, and so have you." She lifted a knee to sit on the side of the bed in front of him. "Don't think I didn't see the cracks. You've been neglecting yourself almost as badly as I've been." Shrugging out of her robe, she beckoned to him with one crooked finger. "Come on, let me do this."

He sighed and stood to take off the robe, then sat facing her, one knee drawn up, mirroring her. A talon brushed the lines of her face before he offered her a small, fluttering smile. "I've missed your touch."

She uncorked the flask and nodded toward the bed. "Then stop talking about it and lay down." When he rolled over onto his front, propped up on his elbows, she straddled his hips. "You can make yourself useful and hold the oil." She poured a thin trail over his cowl, then a small puddle into her hand. After passing him the flask, she rubbed her hands together then started massaging the oil into his hide.

"Mmm." He let his head hang, soft moans purring through his second larynx.

His hide was so dried out from neglect that it absorbed the entire flask and still could have taken more, but by then, he lay sprawled on his back, sound asleep and snoring. Shepard finished rubbing down his feet, then crawled up to press a soft kiss to the upper plate of his mouth.

"I love you," she whispered, caressing his cheekbones with her thumbs. "You beautiful, impossible, stubborn, amazing _torin_." She kissed him again, then slipped off the bed, covering him up before changing into her sleepwear.

After turning off the light, she walked to the window and looked out over the dark city, only Nanus peeking over the horizon, not yet high enough to splash it's pale silver light over the rubble and new buildings.

"Wherever you are, baby girl," Shepard whispered, "I hope you're safe and well. Hang in there." She reached up, her palm pressed to the warm glass. "Your daddy and I are searching for you, and we won't ever give up." A wavering sigh drifted between her lips as a vague achiness washed over her. "I love you and miss you so much. Sleep well, beautiful girl."

Garrus rolled over, pulling her into his arms, when she slipped between the covers. Pressing against his length, she closed her eyes, allowing his warmth to seep into her, and fell asleep.

**July 29, 2188**

"Holy cow," Shepard said, a low whistle following the words from her lips. "Look at this place." She looked up, following the sweeping lines of the new government building. It sat dead center in the middle of Cipritine, soaring above the rest of the city core like a magnificent, multi-faceted jewel.

Garrus followed her out of the skycar and stepped up to her side. "It's almost finished. They wanted to wait to have the confirmations and swearing of oaths until they completed construction."

Her husband's arm wrapped warm and supportive around Shepard's waist, guiding her toward the massive blue-silver glass and steel structure. "You're looking . . . what's the term . . . picked? . . . today. You feeling okay?"

Shepard chuckled. "I think you meant peaked, pale and tired." She leaned into him a little. "I'm fine, just think I'm coming down with a cold. Medicine can bring me back from the dead, but still no cure for the common cold." Meeting his concerned stare, she shrugged a little. "And a little sad. Running around like a crazy woman didn't give me much time to be sad." She stopped ten metres back and looked up at the building. "Wow. This is amazing."

Panels along the front of the building depicted scenes from turian history realized in beautifully detailed cut glass. The panels on either side and over the doors showed the battles to save Palaven and other turian worlds from the Reapers. Shepard stared up at the meticulous, detailed work and shuddered.

"I don't know how I feel about Reaper art," she whispered. "There was nothing beautiful about those abominations, so this . . .." She rubbed Mercy's back through the wrap, looking down at her daughter, curled up with her ear over mother's heart. Seeing the Reapers, even in that innocuous form filled her with a desolate chill, but she fought it off with her daughter's beauty and warmth. As horrendous as the Reapers and the war were, without them, she probably never would have met Garrus and had the family that was growing out from that.

Garrus nodded and gave her a supportive squeeze. "Wait until you see the Chamber of the First Tier. I think you'll appreciate the art there a little more."

She smiled and shook her head. "Don't get me wrong, it's all beautiful, even those monstrosities. Palaven really has done what Sparatus said and made itself a beacon. I think we really need to encourage cultural identity and distinction during the rebuilding process on all the planets."

He stepped up, activating the doors. "I thought Earth would end up being the new galactic hub, to be honest. With the Citadel in its orbit, it seemed a natural choice. Palaven has always kept itself isolated. In fact, I think that was part of the reason for the uprisings: the colonies, Taetrus especially, felt cut off and rejected by the homeworld."

People going and coming called friendly greetings when they spotted Garrus and Shepard. As odd as it felt to have people behave in such a familiar manner, most of galaxy seemed to feel as though the two of them were old friends.

Shepard responded to greetings with nods and smiles. "Hmm, something to keep in mind as we all rebuild. Make sure that the colonies know that the homeworlds remember them both fiscally and in the more universal sense." She stopped and looked up at the vaulted ceilings, her eye drawn up along the graceful, sweeping lines of the pillars and supports. "It just keeps getting more amazing."

Shaking her head in wonder, she addressed his earlier thought about Earth. "With Earth and Alliance losing their entire governments, they just aren't able to step up to be the center of anything. We'll be lucky to have viable governments in place within the next year. At least the turian colonies still have Adrien and the hierarchy to fall back on."

"Yeah. Adrien is adamant about that not letting the colonies feel cut off or ignored. Until they're ready to reform their own governments, he has them nominating hierarchs. He's created portfolios to deal with the colonies as well. I'll be heading the colonial rebuilding committee." Garrus shook his head as if still not convinced he was becoming a politician.

Shepard smiled and ran her hand down his arm as she turned back to stare up at two massive figures wrought from silver-blue glass that stood just inside the main doors. Tendrils of gold worked their way through the spun glass that depicted two warriors locked in battle. Sword and pike clashed over Shepard's head, framing the door.

She backed up to see the figures more clearly. "Is this _hyalus_?"

Garrus nodded and looked up as well. "These are the two most ancient surviving pieces. They're more than 8,000 cycles old."

"They're spun glass, right? How the heck . . .? They're six metres tall if they're a centimetre." Grinning, she shook her head. "I've never seen anything like them."

"They've never been repeated. Even today's masters of the art have no idea how they were made." He shrugged. "One of our many mysteries."

Shepard wrapped her arm around him. "You turians do love to be a mystery."

"Speaking of mysteries, wait until you see the chamber." His mandible fluttered in a teasing smile. "But that will have to wait a few days. I want you to see it . . .." He shrugged and took her hand and led her toward an elevator.

"You want me to see it in the moment, I understand." She squeezed his hand. "You won't mind having a hooting and hollering cheering section, will you? I might not be able to contain myself."

He chuckled and shook his head. "That may be a first . . . a hierarch having his mate tossed out of the proceedings for creating a disturbance." Bending down, he nuzzled her temple, warmth and love spreading through her from the contact.

He sighed and pulled back. "I actually have to spend today hiring a staff. Do you mind sitting in and seeing what sort of feeling you get from them?" He winced and squeezed her fingers when she nodded. "I'd better get confirmed after all of this." A helpless sort of shrug preceded hitting the elevator control. "What am I supposed to do with a staff?"

"Being confirmed is all but a done deal, Vakarian, and I imagine you'll need them. Adrien's given you what . . . four portfolios and at least two committees?" She stopped and tugged on his hand, turning him to face her. Meeting his eyes with a steady, serious gaze, she let out a long breath. "As long as this is what you want, Garrus. If you want to do something, anything, else, you just need to say the word. You know there is always a place at the academy for you . . . whatever." She smiled, the warmth spreading and settling in her chest. "You are capable of anything. I know that you'll be brilliant as a hierarch, but I don't want you to feel like you've been roped into it, love."

He stepped into the elevator and gave her a firm nod. "I know I can do some good here, Shepard. Adrien has brilliant, ambitious plans that will meet with a lot of resistance. I can help him overcome it." Looking down on her, he smiled, a slight flutter of mandibles. "Something I've learned over the last year on the _Normandy_ is that your life is not defined by what you do while working, it's defined by what is most important to you. Helping my home recover is important to me. Not as important as you and the girls, _Pari_, and Sol, but important."

She pressed in against his side. "I love you, Hierarch Vakarian."

They exited the elevator on the top floor. Shepard stopped a few steps in and looked up into the impossibly intricate tangle of steel composite that supported the roof. It made her feel as if she was falling up into a massive fractal or mandala. Garrus tugged on her hand, pulling her from her contemplation - almost meditation.

"If you ever lose me, this will be where you'll find me, staring into the rafters like some sort of lunatic." Shaking her head, she allowed him to move her along a wide hall. The walls harkened back to turian house interiors, plastered and washed in warm, earthy colours with stone trim. Unlike the _domin_s she'd seen, however, the trim made up abstract patterns, like the frame Herros and Lenka made for their cabin, rather than scenes.

A large, carved door made out of the nearly black wood opened into a spacious, six-sided office, a wooden desk taking up almost a third of the floor space. Four interior doors, each just as beautifully detailed as the next opened into three offices and a conference room. A few large, comfortable chairs and side tables lined the walls between the doors. Every piece looked as though it had seen at least five centuries of dedicated and loving care.

"The back door is to my security detail's office," Garrus said, seeming almost embarrassed. "Adrien wants me to hire three more dedicated to me and six more for the house, you, and the kids." He shook his head. "So many people to follow around two people of the most deadly people in the galaxy."

Shepard nodded. "I know it seems excessive, but when it comes to you and the kids, I'm all for it. Better safe than sorry. I have to find someone to watch Mercy during the day when classes start at the academy, and you can bet your ass they'll be a commando or something." She shrugged. "I wonder if Samara is looking for work."

He stepped to the first door on the left. "This is my office." Chuckling, he shook his head. "I have an office."

Shepard walked through the door and smiled. "Wow, you sure do. It's amazing." Just as beautiful as the building, the office was filled with antique furniture and a couple of very comfortable looking couches. She settled herself on one. "I've found my spot."

She burrowed into the soft cushions and watched her husband try to find himself in his new space. He sat at the desk, rifled through the drawers, woke up his computer and then looked over at her and shrugged, his mandibles dropping.

"I think I've made a mistake."

She chuckled. "You'll get used to it."

"Where's my desk?" Barl asked, sticking his head in the door.

"Back room," Garrus answered. "The one with the sturdiest chair."

The krogan let out a noise that could have been laughter or a growl and pulled back. "I doubt they make any that can withstand me for very long."

Shepard stood and followed him as he withdrew through the door. "I'll help you pick one."

Again, his harsh laugh rolled through the space, echoing off walls and surfaces that desperately needed the baffling effect of habitation and all the detritus that went along with it. "You don't really want to help me pick out a desk, do you, Missus?"

"Sure I do." She herded him toward the office that Garrus had pointed out. "It's just not all I want to do." Once they were through the door, she closed it.

Barl walked over to the first desk and sat on the edge. He opened his mouth to speak, then closed it and waited for her.

"You need to be his shadow, Barl. I don't care if he tells you to check on me, or to get coffee or whatever. You have one job, and that's bringing my husband home every night." She hitched Mercy a little further up her shoulder and perched on the nearest chair.

"He's not going to make that easy. You know that." He met her gaze with a weary sort of openness. "He's used to being the gun hand."

She nodded. "Yeah, but that's why I'm glad he's got you. You have a thousand years of dealing with a lot worse than him under your belt." Her brows pulled in and down toward her nose. "I intend to have a small herd of children with that _torin_ once we get Lenka back and get settled. I intend to build a big, beautiful life centered around him." A long, soft sigh drifted between them. "Are you able to see where I'm coming from?"

Barl nodded. "I am, and I'll do my best to make sure that little one and the ones to come have a father." He shrugged, massive shoulders heaving like a mountain erupting. "But, he's the boss."

"True." She pressed her lips together and nodded. "But of the two of us, I'm the more likely to eviscerate you. Just remember that." She softened the threat with a smile. "Where do you live?"

"So you can sneak up on me in my sleep?" He frowned, looking as though he suspected her of setting him up. "In the barracks with my old unit."

"If I had an apartment built in the basement of our _domin_, would you live in it?" She looked down as Mercy woke up and began to wriggle around. Shepard extricated her from the wrap and kissed her. "Well hello there, my little biscuit. Was it getting warm in there, or are you just looking for a snack?" Looking up at Barl, Shepard cocked an eyebrow, asking for an answer.

"Why? You just looking to make sure you've got an extra gun handy?" He crossed his arms, his whole manner as rigid as it was relaxed the moment before.

Shepard shook her head and stood. "No." Her eyes narrowed as she stared at him. "I think you need to be connected to something. You've had a thousand years to perfect being the lone warrior, and something tells me that it doesn't cut it any more." She walked over to him and looked him in the eye. "I'm offering you a chance to be part of a family, Barl. It's up to you whether or not you take it." Punching his shoulder, she gave him a crooked smile. "Either way, I'm trusting you to take my place at Garrus's back."

She walked to the door, turning back with her hand on the control. "Oh, and use that chair over in the corner. It doesn't roll around or anything, but is big and comfortable looking. It should last you."

"Is Barl terrified of you, now?" Garrus asked when she walked back into his office.

Shepard shook her head and settled herself and Mercy back on the couch. "Of course not. I helped him pick out a good chair."

A tentative knock at the outer door cut off his answer to that, and he had to settle for giving her a suspicious glare on his way to usher in the first office manager candidate.

After she went through the reports of every agent she, Liara, Adrien, and Hackett had dedicated to the task of finding Lenka, Shepard spent the day working on organizing the groundwork for the From Ashes Foundation. The massive amount of money she'd syphoned off from the Apostles sat in a holding account. She wanted it to do something great with it, but had yet to figure out what. First, she and Liara needed to build a legal foundation. The Shadow Broker had located a team of her old lawyers on Illium once the comms came back up. Barla Von, the canny little fellow, had survived the war as well and was looking for places to invest the foundation's funds as soon as Shepard sorted things.

"Well?" Garrus asked as he reentered the office after escorting the last office manager candidate out the door.

"I got a really good feeling from the second asari and the one turian . . .." She squinted, trying to recall the female's name. "Darana?" Shepard nodded thoughtfully. "I can see her keeping your butt kicked into line."

Garrus shook his head. "Hmm. Yeah, I see your criteria now. Good thing you didn't handle the posting. I'd have krogan office managers waiting in a line all the way out the building." He yawned and stretched, leaning back in his chair. "I liked Darana too. She seemed to have an open mind, probably from attending universities on both Thessia and Earth." He called up her CV on the datapad. "Is Harvard a good school?"

Shepard shrugged. "Yeah, I've heard some good things." After a second, she laughed. "Yes, it's one of the best schools on the planet." The laugh turned to a frown. "Why does she want to work for you with such a stellar education?"

He shrugged. "I'll call her and your other choice back later in the week after we've had time to put together some more questions?"

Shepard started to answer, but the first of the security potentials knocked on the door.

* * *

"The gardens have to go in yet. Any requests?" Gira called from the back seat of the car.

"_Rylamia_ for sure," Shepard replied without even needing to think. "And lots of shade. Lenka won't have any protection from the sun, and she'll want to be able to play with her brothers and sisters outside." She reached over to the driver's side of the car for Garrus's hand. "And then, whatever Garrus's mom had planted. Make it as much like it was while still having shade."

Garrus turned his hand over to hold hers. "That sounds really good." He smiled. "She had a seating area up on the higher section with these big, comfortable couches. We'd sprawl across them in the evenings, drink _puala_ nectar, and tell her about our day." He parked the car on the double patch of tarmac and popped the top.

Shepard stayed seated for a moment. Just after lunch a vague ache had settled into her gut. Maybe she'd eaten something that didn't agree with her, maybe she really was coming down with the flu. She pushed the queasiness aside with a deep breath.

"You coming, Shepard?" he called from the front door.

She climbed from the car, plastering a smile on her face. "I sure am. Can't wait to see it."

Gira led the way from the skycar to the front door. Shepard had seen the outside from a distance, it was easily seen from Gira's back garden, but up close she could see the cut glass detail around the edges of the large windows along the front. Shaking her head, she reached back to squeeze the elder female's hand, gratitude filling her with warmth.

Opening the front door, Gira stepped back, motioning for Shepard to walk through first.

She made it five paces, slowing a little more with each step until she ground to a halt, mouth open, trying to look everywhere at once. "Oh my god," she whispered, holding her hand out for Garrus's. "It's the most beautiful home I've ever seen."

The walls of the common areas had all been washed a warm, golden-hued dark cream. Along the bottom half metre of the walls and _caman_, wild horses frolicked across prairies and woodlands. Some ran, others grazed, still others bucked and reared. "How . . .?"

A wide smile making her eyes shine and her mandibles flick, Gira nodded toward Garrus. "He said you liked horses and sent me pictures."

Shepard finally managed to make her legs work again and wandered into the _caman_, running her free hand over the counters. Much more like a human kitchen than Gira's, the room still managed to retain the simple warmth. "I can't wait to see it with your_ mari_ and _pari_'s legacy furnishing it." It filled her with a simple but profound gratitude to see the subtle hints of human influence. It was a home designed to make both its turian and human inhabitants comfortable.

Garrus nodded, his eyes glassy.

"You see it, don't you?" she whispered, wrapping her arm around him. "The table over there, covered in homework and toys. Dinner smoking in the sink while one of us calls for take out."

Another silent nod met her question. After a moment, he sighed. "Especially the burned dinner part."

"Yeah. We need to learn to cook." Out of the corner of her eye, Shepard caught a flash of movement, a shrill giggle cutting through the silence. Lenka raced through, glancing behind and squealing as she raced away from someone.

"There are two bathrooms on this floor and two upstairs," Gira said, breaking apart the ghosts as she started down the hall. "Two bedrooms down here and five upstairs."

"Five," Shepard muttered to herself. "We're going to need a battalion to clean this place."

They followed, checking out the bathroom, office and second bedroom, but they didn't grind to a halt again until they stepped into the master bedroom. Taking up almost a quarter of the first floor, it boasted its own bathroom, two massive closets and bookshelves along one wall. The walls reflected the light of early evening off the dark green wash, the carved doors gleaming warm and welcoming in that same soft glow.

Shepard hugged Garrus tight, the part of her the batarians had cut loose to drift nearly twenty years earlier, settling back into place. As it did, the black hole stretched and yawned, spitting out another obsidian splinter that sliced straight through her heart.

_Just settle right in, forget Lenka ever existed._

Shepard closed her eyes and leaned into Garrus, fighting to shove the hopelessness that slithered through her back down into the hole. Moving into their home didn't mean leaving Lenka behind. It didn't.

They'd settle in, prepare Lenka's room, and have somewhere beautiful to bring her home to. The snakes ignored her, wrapping their gelid, clammy bodies around her heart.

Garrus let out a sigh. "Everything is for her and Mercy, Shepard. Not to leave her behind, but to have a life for her to return to."

Shepard nodded and pulled back. "It's beautiful and perfect." She forced a smile through the vague ache in her belly. "Let's get back. I'm tired." Her legs trembled slightly as she wrapped an arm around him and returned to the car.


End file.
